Save You
by MusicLover315
Summary: When Hiro gets forced out of the house on his day off from school, he doesn't expect to meet the first person his age that he could actually call a friend. However, it doesn't take long for him to notice that there's more to his new friend than meets the eye. That doesn't scare him though, because Hiro knows that she's worth it. AU where Tadashi is alive Hiro x OC
1. Chapter 1

**Oh my gosh! Hello!**

 **I'm so excited to have another story to be posting on Fanfiction! I haven't been on here for quite some time and have really missed it. Sure, I'm writing stories all the time, but I never really post any of them because I either lose inspiration or just don't find myself liking it and put it aside to re-write later on.**

 **Sadly enough, this is the first story that I have finished in years (not counting the one-shot I wrote). Yeah, depressing isn't it? On the bright side though, I finished this one! And yes, I already have this entire story written and will be posting weekly (every Friday). I tend to feel more comfortable writing my stories first before posting them so if I want to change something or edit something in later on, I can do that freely without angering anybody. The only problem that tends to come along with that, however, is the fact that it does take me a long time to write the whole story so you probably won't be seeing another story on here for a while unless I decide to write a one-shot.**

 **I don't really mind though. It not only allows me to write at my own pace, but it also saves you guys from having to wait an agonizing amount of time for the next chapter or even from having to worry about me abandoning it. So there. Remember that this story will not be put on hold or discontinued, it will continue to be updated once a week for as many weeks as it runs for!**

 **Anyways, I'm going off topic here. Point is, I'm so happy to be back! I really hope you guys like this story! Feel free to leave your thoughts in a review or even PM me if you want! Like I said, I've already written the entire story so I will not change anything, but still feel free to give me your ideas or thoughts on what may happen. I love hearing what you guys have to say! Also, if you notice any huge grammar mistakes (not small stuff like forgetting a comma or something), please PM me and let me know and I'll try to fix it! Thank you and have fun reading!**

 **Disclaimer: I do not own Big Hero 6 or any of it's characters. I do, however, own my character, Alex, so XP.**

* * *

Hiro sighed to himself as he strolled down the streets of San Fransokyo, his hands shoved deep into the pockets of his blue hooded jacket, looking for something to do to fill up his oddly free schedule for the day. He's been walking around for a little less than an hour already, but has yet to find anything interesting to occupy his time. He could easily just go back to the nerd lab and work on one of the projects he had started, but he just wasn't in that type of mood today.

In an attempt at curing his boredom, he tried calling Gogo, Wasabi, and Fred to see if they wanted to catch a movie or head over to the arcade for a little while, but they all seemed busy with something or another. And he knew for a fact that Honey and Tadashi were out of the question considering what had occurred to make him leave the café in the first place.

 _~Flashback~_

"Hey Aunt Cass," Hiro called out as he walked into the kitchen where his aunt was glazing a couple dozen doughnuts with winter designs.

She looked up from her work to smile at the 15-year-old who started half-heartedly inspecting the confectionary treats was working on for the past hour or so. She quickly checked the front counter through the large opening in the wall to make sure nobody was waiting to pay before she replied to her nephew, "Good morning Hiro! Or should I say good afternoon. It is one o-clock in the afternoon after all. You really should work on your sleeping habits or you're going to throw your entire sleeping schedule off."

He chuckled at his aunt's concern, "Don't worry Aunt Cass, it's not like I stay up until three A.M. every morning. I just had a project that kept me up all night. I had to finish the layout for it so I could start working on it this weekend, so I figured I might as well whack it out in one night and get it out of the way."

"Well at least you were doing something productive instead of sitting in front of the TV playing video games," she rambled, grabbing a towel to wipe at the the small sheen of sweat that's accumulated on her forehead.

"Hey," Hiro retorted, "it's not like I do that often. By the way, when are they coming to fix the AC?"

"I have no idea hun," she sighed as she grabbed the blue bag of icing, "all I know is that we're lucky it's winter and people are looking for a warm place to relax. Me on the other hand, I could go for a little air conditioning right now. I'm sweating like crazy back here."

"Are you sure you don't need any help? I don't mind staying here and working today," he reminded her with sincere look. He hated to see his aunt over work herself for the sake of the café. He knows she loved this café with all of her heart, but he knows that she still gets a little stressed with it sometimes.

"Oh no, don't worry about me! It's not even that busy today. Go, enjoy your free time while it lasts," she brushed him off without even looking up from the snowflake she just frosted onto a glazed, jelly-filled doughnut.

"Alright," he said hesitantly, but brushed it off. "Hey, have you seen Tadashi?"

"Tadashi?" she said, finally lifting her head to look him in the eyes. "Oh! Yes, he's sitting at table eight with Honey. They've been talking for a couple of hours now I believe."

Hiro looked out the service window in confusion, thinking that Tadashi has gone out for the day, but sure enough, there sat his brother and one of his good friends at a small table near the window chatting away. One of them must have said something hilarious because they both suddenly burst into a fit of laughter.

Curious as to why the rest of the group wasn't here, Hiro walked out of the kitchen and made his way over to their table to see where everybody else was.

When he arrived, both of the table's occupants looked up at him with smiles plastered on their flushed faces.

"Oh, hello Hiro!" Honey chirped happily.

"Hey," he said cautiously at her tone of voice. Honey is known to be quite optimistic and bubbly, but she seems even more so than usual today.

"Is there something you need?" Tadashi asked giving him a stern, pleading look. Hiro didn't necessarily understand why his brother seemed to want him to leave, so he didn't pay much mind to it as he continued on.

"Nah, I was just wondering where everybody else was. Were they all busy or something?" he asked taking a seat next to his brother.

Tadashi rolled his eyes at his little brother, wondering how a single person could be so clueless towards a situation. He turned to the onyx haired boy and mumbled, "We were kind of hoping for some alone time so we didn't really invite anybody else."

"Why? Did Fred say something to piss you off again? He can have his moments, but he means no harm." Hiro said in complete oblivion.

At this point, Tadashi just stared at Hiro while Honey held a hand to her mouth to hide her giggling.

Well, Tadashi thought, he may be a genius at robotics, but he's definitely lacking in other areas.

"It has nothing to do with anybody else Hiro," Tadashi said with a forced smile, "we'd just like some alone time. So if you wouldn't mind." He trailed off, shooing him away like a cat.

Everything then seemed to click for Hiro as he stood up quickly shouting out, "Oh! Are you two on a date?"

Tadashi just sighed and stood up before forcing his little brother away from their table.

"Really?" was all he said when they got far enough away from the table that Honey couldn't hear them.

"Heh heh, whoops. Didn't mean for that to come out so loudly," Hiro admitted sheepishly. He had to admit, that definitely wasn't one of his brightest moments.

"Yeah, yeah. Why don't you go do something outside the house today. It may be cold, but that doesn't mean you have to be stuck here all day. Why don't you go bowling or something," he suggested to the younger boy.

"Well," Hiro said thoughtfully before a slight smirk made its way onto his face, "I guess I could do that. I wonder if GoGo, Wasabi, and Fred want to go. You know, considering you've abandoned not just me, but everybody else as well."

"Hey! I'm not abandoning you or anybody else and you know it," he said sending a playful glare.

The still smirking boy put his hands up to surrender, "Yeah, yeah, I know. You just want some alone time with your precious Honey-bear."

"Goodbye Bonehead!" Tadashi said, lightly shoving Hiro towards the exit.

As the café door closed behind him, Hiro just smiled to himself before making his way down the sidewalk to god-knows-where.

 _~Flashback End~_

This left Hiro where he is now, walking around aimlessly without a clue as to where he could go. As he was walking however, he remembered something important.

He couldn't go anywhere even if he tried. He forgot his wallet at home when Tadashi rushed him out the door. That's just terrific.

Hiro was then pulled out of his thoughts by someone crashing right into him, resulting in both of them sprawled out on the floor with all of the other person's belongings scattered around them.

Rubbing his head from where it came into contact with the concrete, Hiro sat up slowly and turned to glare at the person who ran into him. He figured that if this person had enough force behind their step to leave him on the floor nursing a bruised cranium, then they were probably somebody that he did not want to pick a fight with. With this being said, he kept his frustration towards what just happened to himself as he picked himself off of the floor and brushed off his clothes.

When he looked over at the culprit however, he was surprised to see that it wasn't a six-foot tall brute with piercings on his eyelids and tattooed tears running down his face. In fact, it was quite the opposite. Instead was a small girl, about his age, with dirty blond hair. He noticed that she did in fact have a piercing on her face, but it was nothing more than a small, diamond stud on the right side of her nose. While Hiro has never really been one for face piercings, he had to admit that this one seemed to suit her quite well.

As she continued to pick up the items that fell out of her duffel bag, she began apologizing profusely for bumping into him.

"I'm so sorry! I swear, sometimes I'm just in such a hurry that I don't even pay attention to what's in front of me," she apologized panic-stricken.

"Oh," Hiro spurted, finally coming out of his small daze, "it's fine. Don't worry about it."

"Are you sure?" she asked, finally standing up and throwing her bag over her shoulder. She stared at him with her large, light blue eyes before continuing, "You're not hurt or anything, right?"

"No, I'm fine. I swear," Hiro assured with a tight smile. It's not often that Hiro talks to people his age, and in the few instances when he has, even when he was younger, it always ended with them calling him a geek or a nerd and/or beating him up. This is the reason that he loves everybody from the nerd lab so much. They don't make fun of him for doing what he loves and being himself.

"Oh, thank god!" she sighed in relief. "I don't know what I would have done if you got hurt. The nearest hospital is pretty far away and I failed first aid class about two times before finally passing so that's out of the question."

Hiro listened to her as she stood there and rambled. To most people, this would probably be annoying to listen to, but for some reason, Hiro kind of found it endearing.

"I never introduced myself, did I? Sorry, I'm Alex," she said placing her hand out for me to shake.

He chuckled lightly before taking her hand and introducing himself, "Hiro; and really, it's not a big deal. No harm no foul right?"

"Haha! Yeah," she laughed. Her eyes then traveled down to the SFIT shirt he had on underneath his jacket with wide eyes, "You go to SFIT? Wow! You look really young for your age."

Hiro subconsciously tensed before he explained his situation to her. This is usually when the onslaught comes, "Actually, I'm only 15. I graduated from high school when I was 12 and got into SFIT when I was around 13."

He stared at her, watching her face carefully for any signs of what was to come. However, her eyes just widened before a dazzling smile made its way onto her face.

"Really? That's so cool! Man I wish I were that smart," she said as she looked at him in admiration.

Nobody's ever given Hiro that type of look before. Sure, Aunt Cass is always gushing over how smart her "little man" is, but nobody has ever really looked up to him before.

Hiro's tense posture immediately loosened up. With a new sense of pride swelling up inside his chest, he replied with a smile of his own, "Yeah, I guess it is."

"Well, I really need to get going Hiro, but maybe we can meet up again some time to talk or something," she said with a hopeful look in her eyes.

Hiro immediately jumped at the idea and quickly agreed with a nod of the head, "Yeah! That sounds awesome."

"Okay, hold on a second," she said as she began rummaging through her bag. "Here we go!" she said as she pulled out a pen. She then surprised Hiro by grabbing his arm and rolling up his sleeve.

"What are you doing?" he asked confusedly.

She just ignored him and began to write something on his wrist. When she was done she pulled away and slipped the pen back in her bag before smiling at him again.

"There's my number. Text me whenever you want to get together okay?" she said rolling on the balls of her feet.

"A-alright," Hiro replied with a small blush on his cheeks. Despite the cold weather, he noticed how warm and flushed he began to feel. He thought that maybe he was getting a classic winter cold, but decided to just ignore for now. He'll just ask Baymax to scan him later.

"Talk to you later then!" she called out as she began running in the direction she was heading to begin with.

Hiro stood there in a small stupor before he looked down at the numbers now decorating his wrist.

What just happened?


	2. Chapter 2

**HELLOOO!**

 **How are you guys? Good? Good. :D**

 **It's been a busy week for me and to be honest I'm exhausted haha! But it's all worth it because now I am able to post chapter 2 for all of you lovelies to read! It's funny, because as I was reading this back to edit it and check for correct grammar, I noticed how weird it felt to actually read the beginning of it again. It's just been a while since everything was simple in this story (wink, wink) and it feels nice haha!**

 **Anyways, I'm going to keep this AN short so you guys can get right into the story. I hope you guys enjoy!**

 **Disclaimer: I do not own Big Hero 6 or any of it's characters. The only character I own is Alex and if she in any way resembled somebody in real life, it is purely by coincidence.**

 **Enjoy.**

* * *

The next morning, Hiro found himself lying in his bed staring at the ceiling with tired, dry eyes. It would be a lie to say that he was able to get any good sleep last night due to a certain blonde that had plagued his thoughts from dusk until dawn. He managed to pass out at some point and got a couple hours of sleep, but not nearly enough to keep away the dark circles that hung under his droopy eyes.

He just couldn't get her out of his head! Hiro didn't know what it was, but he found that he couldn't help the giddiness that popped up every time he thought about seeing her again. Maybe it was the fact that she was the first person around his age that was willing to hang out with him or maybe it was just his lack of experience when it came to hanging out with girls.

He didn't quite know for sure, but whatever it was, he kind of liked it.

He sighed as he sat up in his bed, turning the alarm clock off so it didn't go off later on when he wasn't there. He looked at the time and saw that it was only 5:23 in the morning. He let out a loud groan before remembering that his brother was still sleeping and probably didn't want to be woken up by such obnoxious sounds.

Hiro stretched his arms as he stood up and walked over to his desk. He couldn't text or call Alex this early in the morning without running the risk of sounding too desperate, so he decided to get some work done and contact her at around 9ish.

Until then, however, he had a ton of paperwork to do.

 **3 Hours Later**

Tadashi woke up from his blissful sleep with a silent yawn. He fell asleep quite early last night and was surprised to see that he had slept in until 8:30. He got up out of bed and groggily made his way over to the sliding door that divides the large room in half.

Expecting to see his little brother sprawled across his bed like he were the victim of a homicide, it came as quite the shocker to Tadashi to actually see his brother awake and pacing back and forth across the room. He occasionally paused to check his phone only to sigh in disappointment and continue his track from one side of his room to the other. This process seemed to be going on for a while which only managed to further confuse the older Hamada brother.

"What's got you so riled up this early in the morning? A mallet to the head couldn't usually get you up at this, and I quote, 'ungodly hour'," Tadashi said with a smirk as his younger brother jumped like a startled cat.

"Geez, what are you trying to do, give me a heart attack?" Hiro replied with a hand to his chest in an attempt to slow his racing heart.

"It's not like I snuck up on you or anything, and I definitely wasn't quiet when I opened the door," Tadashi chuckled in amusement. He noticed Hiro dismiss him and check his phone again, leading him to ask, "Are you expecting an important call or something?"

"Kind of," Hiro replied absent-mindedly, "I'm waiting for a reply."

Tadashi wondered who could possibly make Hiro this antsy with a simple text. The only time he's ever seen his brother get anywhere close to this was when he used to wait for information on bot fights. Knowing this didn't manage to ease any of his worries. In fact, it only managed to increase them.

"Oh yeah, from who?" Tadashi asked suspiciously.

"A friend," Hiro waved dismissively.

Tadashi raised an eyebrow and hesitantly chose to believe him. He remembered Hiro promising him to quit sneaking off to bot fights and he trusts him to make the right decisions.

"Okay, well I'm going to take a shower," Tadashi called out as he grabbed his stuff and made his way to the bathroom, not even waiting for an answer from the distracted teen. He knew that he'd figure out what all of that was about eventually, so he figured he wouldn't worry about it for now.

When Tadashi had left the room, Hiro decided to stop pacing and sit on his desk chair. He finally worked up the nerve to text Alex about twenty minutes ago and has been waiting for a reply ever since.

At first he thought that it may still be too early and that he shouldn't worry about it, but he couldn't help it as he let his mind drift.

What if she doesn't want to hang out anymore? What if she gave me the wrong number to embarrass me? What if she has a boyfriend?

Whoa! Where did that last one come from?

Suddenly, a buzzing sound from his phone alerted him that he had a new message.

He moved with a speed he never knew he had when he reached for the phone that had previously been placed on the bed. He quickly swiped the screen to unlock it and smiled in relief when he saw that it was indeed from Alex. He re-read his previous text first.

 _Hey Alex, it's Hiro. I'm off today and I was just wondering if you wanted to meet up._

After reading that, he scrolled down to see her response.

 _Oh, hey Hiro! Yeah, that would be great! I'm kind of in school right now, but maybe we can meet up afterwards if that's okay with you?_

Of course! How could he forget that she was still in high school? He feels like such an idiot for worrying over nothing. He clicked on the little message box and began to type a reply.

 _Yeah that's fine. Sorry to bother you in the middle of class. I hope you didn't get in trouble or anything._

It wasn't even 30 seconds after he sent that message when he got a reply.

 _Don't worry about it, my chem teacher is blind as a bat lol. So, where do you want to meet up?_

He thought this over for a moment. He wants to tell her to just meet him here, but he could already feel the humiliation his aunt and brother will bring upon him if they find out that he made a new friend, and a girl none-the-less. If Hiro wanted to form any sort of relationship with this girl, he couldn't have his family scaring her off before he even got the chance to talk to her. With that in mind, he thought of the next best place for them to go.

 _Is the arcade near the San Fransokyo theater okay with you?_

He waited nervously hoping that she wasn't the type of girl that hated video games and found the arcade disgusting. That sure would put a damper on things.

Finally the phone buzzed again and when he read the text, a smile lit up his face as he sighed in relief.

 _That's perfect! I love the arcade! I'll meet you there at 5 okay? I have some homework I need to get done before I leave._

That gives him more than enough time to get ready and calm his nerves down.

 _Alright, see you then_

As soon as he pressed 'send' he flung his phone back down on the bed and jumped up with a shout of victory.

This was the exact moment that Tadashi had walked back into the room, clad in a white V-neck, blue jeans, and a towel flung over his shoulder. He stood in the doorway with a raised brow as the boy in front of him continued to jump for joy.

Hiro turned around when he heard somebody clear their throat and froze when his eyes met those of his older brother.

"Heh heh, hey there big bro," he smiled sheepishly.

"You're such a weirdo," was all Tadashi said in response. He smiled at his brother and walked over to his corner of the room, choosing to ignore what he had just witnessed.

Hiro smirked a bit before racing down-stairs to get something to eat to fuel him up for the long day ahead of him.


	3. Chapter 3

**I'm SOOOO sorry!**

 **I know I was supposed to update yesterday, but things came up. Things out of my control :(**

 **Basically, I went to a waterpark with my friend last night and was dead set on updating when I got home, but after we left I started feeling really sick and had to go to sleep without updating. Then, I was going to update early this morning, but I didn't wake up until like 8 and by then I had to start getting ready to go to the movies.**

 **So yeah, I've been busy but I'm posting today so I hope you guys are okay with me being a bit off schedule.**

 **Speaking of the movie though! Me, my friends, and my parents went to see Dragon Ball Z: Resurrection F and it was really good! I honestly liked Battle of Gods more, but that does not in any way mean that this movie was bad or anything. One issue that I had with it, however, was that it was kind of anti-climatic due to the fact that Frieza had absolutely no chance against two Super Saiyan Gods. Like really, Frieza you were screwed from the start. Other than that, I really enjoyed it! I absolutely loved how Whis and Beerus did nothing but eat the entire movie once again. I love their characters so much, haha!**

 **Anyways, enough of my nerdiness. One thing I must say though is that if you're a Dragon Ball fan, go watch Battle of Gods and Resurrection F. They were really good!**

 **One more thing, I wanted to start doing responses to reviews in here. I always see people doing this on here and it just makes sense for me do to it as well! With that being said, here are my responses to your reviews! :D**

 **REVIEWS:**

 ** _Bre CC:_** I'm so happy that you decided to start reading Big Hero 6 Fanfiction! And to think that I was your first is so exciting! ;D There are some pretty good ones out there for this fandom though so I would have to say you made a good choice! Also, I'm glad that you like it! I hope you keep reading till the end. You're definitely in for a ride.

 _ **Momijifan Low-Ki:**_ Yup! Magical things always happen at the arcade! And I feel honored to have captured your attention. Hopefully I can keep it ;)

 _ **Lily:**_ Haha! Well, I'm glad you like Alex and this story so much! I hope I don't disappoint you. When I was writing this story I really didn't want to make Alex a Mary-sue type of character, but I also kept into consideration that Alex is still a human being and human beings have breaking points. I hope you like what's to come though!

 ** _I.C.2014:_** Thank you! I hope you enjoy this chapter :)

 **So there you guys go! I'll be doing this from now on in my author's notes so keep on sending the reviews in! Now, onto what you guys came here for: the story!**

 **DISCLAIMER: I do not own Big Hero 6, any of it's characters, or Sharknado 3.**

 **SECOND DISCLAIMER: There may be some slight spoilers for Sharknado 3 in this chapter so if you haven't seen it yet and were planning to, look out for that. I don't think it's anything major, but I figured I'd mention it just in case.**

 **ENJOY!**

* * *

Looking into the window on the side of the building, Hiro went over his appearance for the umpteenth time since he arrived outside the arcade five minutes prior.

After attempting to fix his unruly hair, he gave up and just decided to leave it the way it was. He didn't really try to dress up or anything, but he still made sure that he wore one of his newer pair of khaki shorts and a t-shirt fresh out of the wash. Of course, he wore his signature jacket, but he made sure to wash it as well before leaving. He wanted to keep it casual considering they were going to be hanging around an arcade.

He tore his gaze away from his reflection in the window and looked around for any signs of Alex. After another five minutes of waiting, he began to worry that maybe she forgot or maybe something more important came up.

Just as he was about to text her to make sure everything was okay, he heard a voice calling out his name over the crowd of people surrounding him.

"Hiro!" called a familiar voice to his right. He looked that way and low and behold, there was Alex, running over to him in a rushed manner.

When she reached him she bent over panting, trying to catch her breath.

"Sorry I'm late, my project took a little longer than planned and I had to run here from 3rd street," she panted. She stood up straight when she finally managed to catch her breath.

Hiro's eyes widened, "You ran all the way from 3rd street? That's nearly 30 minutes on foot!"

She smiled sheepishly at him before replying, "Yeah, I was at a friend's house to finish a project that's due tomorrow and we kind of took a bit longer than expected. Plus, it didn't really help that she lives on the other side of town. Sorry to make you wait."

"No! I've only been here for like five minutes," Hiro said, brushing it off as if it were no big deal. "If you don't mind me asking, what kind of project were you working on?"

"Oh," she gasped in excitement, "we were doing some last minute adjustments to one of my recent songs that I'm supposed to be presenting to the class tomorrow."

"Song?" Hiro asked confusedly.

"Yeah, we're supposed to write a song per quarter to present to the class and one song at the end of the year to perform at this huge festival our school holds," she stated.

"Wow, I didn't know public schools these days focused so much on their music department," Hiro mumbled thoughtfully. Alex's head tilted in confusion before her eyes widened in realization.

"Oh! I never told you, did I? I go to the San Fransokyo School of Fine Arts," she said, cursing herself for being so forgetful.

"Really? Well I guess all the song writing makes sense now," Hiro laughed as he began to walk over to the doors of the arcade. Alex let out a small chuckle as she went to follow him.

"Yeah, it's like right down the street from SFIT. I pass by there all the time, that's the only reason I recognized the symbol on your shirt so quickly yesterday."

It amazed Hiro that they have never ran into each other before yesterday. Of course Hiro knew about SFFA; he passes by it all the time on the way to SFIT. He's also seen many of the students from SFFA hanging around with kids from SFIT, which makes it even more surprising that he's never seen Alex around before. Even if they didn't meet, Hiro is not at all one to forget a face; especially one as pretty as Alex's.

They both walked into the arcade and got in line to purchase their coins.

"Yeah, I pass by SFFA a lot too," Hiro said in response.

Alex smiled and replied enthusiastically, "I guess we're kind of like neighbors then if you think about it!"

Hiro chuckled at the comment which made Alex smile, showing off her dazzling pearly whites.

They finally reached the coin machine after a few more minutes of talking about nothing in particular. Both Hiro and Alex had already seemed to warm up to each other, skipping the whole awkward stage of a first meeting. In fact, to any other bystander looking in, they looked like they had been best friends for ages.

"So Hiro," Alex said with a challenging glint in her eyes as they walked into the main room with their individual cups full of coins, "you any good at air hockey?"

"Any good?" Hiro scoffed with a cocky grin. "Please, I'm known around here as the master."

"Oh yeah, you willing to put your money where your mouth is?" she asked with an arrogant smile to match.

"You're on."

* * *

"Hey Aunt Cass," Tadashi greeted as he entered the Lucky Cat Café. He had just gotten back from a date with Honey and was still on a bit of a euphoric high. He still couldn't believe that she said yes when he asked her to be his girlfriend earlier today. He finally had the girl of his dreams and he couldn't be happier.

"Oh, hey hon! What's got you in such a chipper mood?" she asked, glancing at him as she wiped down the counter near the cash register.

"Oh nothing… I just finally asked Honey out and she said yes," he said casually, but on the inside he was still jumping for joy like a six year old in a candy store.

Aunt Cass's eyes widened before she let out a yelp of excitement, "That's great! Oh my gosh, I've been waiting for this day to come. Scratch that, everybody has been waiting for this! Man, Gogo owes me a lot of money next time I see her."

"Wait," Tadashi started, "you and Gogo bet on when we would get together?"

"Of course not honey," she said quickly, "Wasabi and Fred were in on it too of course."

"Aunt Cass!"

"I'm sorry, okay! Anyways, I'm so proud of you! This calls for celebration," she said determined. "How about for dinner tonight, I make those special wings. You know, the ones that melt your face off?"

Tadashi smiled, a small chuckle escaping through his lips, "Sounds great Aunt Cass. By the way, where's Hiro? I wanted to talk to him."

Aunt Cass thought to herself for a moment and shrugged, "He said he was going to the lab to work on some project and that he'd be home at around 7."

Tadashi frowned remembering what Hiro said about wanting to take a little break from working while he had the chance. All of the colleges in the area just took their mid-terms were currently off for winter break. With that being said, why would he go in today?

Knowing that Aunt Cass worries herself over even the smallest things, Tadashi decided to keep this information to himself for now since it wasn't that big of a deal. Still though, he couldn't help but think about what his little brother was really up to today.

* * *

"That was so awesome!" Alex shouted as they exited the arcade. "Who knew they were going to premier the new Sharknado 3 movie in an arcade?"

"I know, right?" Hiro agreed. "I'm not one for SyFi originals, but I must say that Sharknado is just amazing!"

"I know! Oh my gosh, that part with the baby almost killed me. I mean, really? And that wasn't even the best part!" she laughed until tears started to form in her eyes.

After a few more minutes of talking about the movie and laughing until their abdomens cramped, they calmed down and walked over to the crosswalk together.

"Man, time flies doesn't it? It's already 8," Alex sighed slightly shocked.

"It's already 8?! Oh no, Aunt Cass if probably freaking out right now," Hiro panicked.

"You live with your aunt?" Alex asked curiously. Hiro sighed as a frown pulled at the edges of his lips.

"Yeah, my parents died a while ago so my brother and I moved in with our Aunt Cass," Hiro said with a far-away look on his face.

"Oh I'm sorry! I didn't mean to bring up any bad memories," Alex apologized quickly. She knows more than anyone that bringing that sort of stuff up is not really pleasant for either party.

"Nah, it's fine. I've gotten over it already," Hiro shrugged. "Anyways, I wasn't expecting to stay out this late, but since it's so dark outside, why don't I walk you home?"

Her eyes widened, "Oh no, it's fine. Really, don't worry about me!"

Hiro eyed her suspiciously, "Are you sure? We aren't in the greatest part of town. I don't really feel comfortable with you walking home by yourself."

"No, no, no I swear. I'm fine really! I don't live too far away so it's no big deal," she assured him with a smile. She may have been smiling, but Hiro clearly saw the hints of panic showing through her eyes.

Deciding to let her off the hook for now, Hiro sighed, "Alright. Just make sure to call or text me when you get there to let me know you made it safely."

All signs of panic disappeared and she let out a small giggle, "Okay father. By the way, it was nice hanging out with you today."

"Yeah, you too," Hiro smiled. "Maybe we can do it again some time?"

Her face instantly brightened as she agreed, "Yeah! How about tomorrow since it's Saturday?"

"Sounds good to me," he said.

"Okay, talk to you later!" she waved as she made her way in the opposite direction as him.

Hiro continued to stand there and watch her until she was out of eyes reach before he started to head home himself. While he was walking, he thought of all that happened today.

When they first got to the arcade, they spent about an hour playing all the different types of games in there. Surprisingly, Alex managed to beat him at Pin-Ball and Air Hockey, two of his favorites. He did manage to cream her in Dance Dance Revolution though, so it made up for his previous losses.

However, while they had a blast messing around and battling each other to many various games throughout the large game hall, that only lasted for about an hour before the manager came over the intercom announcing that they were playing a one-night showing of Sharknado 3. Alex's face perked up at the news and she ended up dragging Hiro into the movie hall where they spent the rest of the night watching horrible CGI graphics, some equally as bad acting, and a plot that left them completely speechless.

Overall, Hiro had a blast in those four hours they spent together. He hadn't had this much fun in such a long time. Sure, he and Tadashi had their days out, but lately he's been spending all of his time either hanging out with Honey or working on some huge project. He had absolutely nothing against his older brother for doing his own thing. It was just nice to have somebody to spend time with one-on-one.

It took Hiro about fifteen minutes to get home. By the time he got to his street, he noticed that the lights in the café were still on, despite it being way past closing time.

Confused, Hiro walked in only to be tackled in a bear hug and bombarded with worried questions.

"Hiro! Where have you been? I've been worried sick! Why didn't you answer my calls or texts?" Aunt Cass rushed out in one breath.

"Whoa, calm down Aunt Cass. I'm fine," he reassured her as he tried to pry himself from her death grip. Sensing his discomfort she released him, but not before pulling him in the door and going into her famous angrily-worried mode.

"Where were you young man? And why didn't you answer your phone? I must have called you a dozen times, but every time all I got was your voicemail where I couldn't even leave a message because you have yet to set up your mailbox," she rambled on in frustration.

Both Hiro and Tadashi know very well that once Aunt Cass starts rambling, she won't stop unless someone intervenes.

"Sorry Aunt Cass, I turned it off when I went to see a movie and must have forgotten to turn it back on," he quickly apologized. He reached into his right pant pocket and pulled out his phone to see that, as expected, it was powered off.

"You went to see a movie by yourself?" Tadashi asked from the booth he had been seated at.

"Hey Tadashi, I didn't expect you to be home!" Hiro smiled at his brother. "And no, I went with a friend. We hit the arcade first and saw the special premier of the week there."

Tadashi frowned before saying, "I thought everybody from the lab was out of town for the week."

"They are," Hiro nodded, "I didn't go with somebody from the nerd lab."

This caught the attention of both Aunt Cass and Tadashi. They both knew how Hiro was treated by most people his age, making it understandable that he doesn't have many friends outside of SFIT. This is why it threw Tadashi and Aunt Cass off that this "friend" wasn't from the Institute.

"Oh really," Aunt Cass said intrigued, "and is this friend of yours your age?"

Hiro sighed as he walked behind the counter to grab a glazed doughnut that had been left over from the day's sales, "Yes and "this friend" has a name."

Tadashi chuckled at his brother's remark, "And would you do us the kind honor of bestowing that knowledge upon our ignorant minds?"

Hiro sent a playful glare at his brother before replying with a short "Alex".

"Oo! What's this Alex like?" Aunt Cass asked excitedly. All previous signs of worry had gone right out the window as she rushed over to the bar like a gossip-crazed high school girl.

Hiro laughed at her enthusiasm while taking another bite of his doughnut and began to answer the question, "Blonde hair, blue eyes, nose piercing-"

"Whoa, whoa, whoa," Tadashi interrupted, cutting Hiro off mid-sentence, "nose piercing?"

"Yeah," Hiro shrugged, "it's just a small one. Not really a big deal."

Tadashi frowned at this. He's never really been a fan of facial jewelry due to the fact that everybody he's seen with it tends to be either a slacker or somebody with a knack for not following rules and getting themselves into trouble. He remembered that one group of kids in high school that had tons of piercings and wore nothing but black, ripped clothes. Those were the kids that were always getting drunk, high, or in trouble.

He wasn't saying that all people who have piercings are wanted criminals or anything, he just knows that half the teens who go to get piercings or tattoos are usually doing it to either piss their parents off or prove someone wrong.

And that was definitely not the type of people that Tadashi wanted Hiro to hang out with.

Tadashi decided to keep this to himself for now though, not wanting to bash his brother's new friend without meeting him first.

"Well," Aunt Cass started hesitantly, thinking the same thing as Tadashi, "are we going to get to meet him any time soon?"

Finishing up his doughnut, Hiro grabbed a napkin and began wiping his hands off before throwing the used napkin in the trashcan near the counter. "First of all, Alex is a girl. Secondly, I just met her yesterday so maybe in like a week."

Tadashi and Aunt Cass's eyebrows rose at this new piece of information. They both sent each other a knowing look.

"Where exactly did you meet her?" she asked curiously.

"Funny story," Hiro laughed awkwardly, "we kind of ran into each other on the street. I helped her with her stuff, we talked a bit and she gave me her number so we could make plans to meet up."

"Isn't that a bit dangerous?" Tadashi inquired. "I mean, you just ran into this girl on the street and you know absolutely nothing about her."

"That's not true!" Hiro argued defensively. "We hung out today and learned a lot about each other. Trust me, she's not like that at all."

"Alright, calm down you two," Aunt Cass interjected, "Hiro, feel free to invite her over any time you'd like. A friend of yours is a friend of ours. Now, down to business; there is a whole platter full of face melting wings upstairs getting cold as we lounge around here talking."

"Wings? What's the occasion?" Hiro asked.

"Tadashi finally asked Honey out, and she said yes!" their aunt squealed excitedly.

Hiro turned to his brother with wide eyes, "What?! Are you serious?"

"Yep," Tadashi said with a proud smirk on his face. He expected Hiro to congratulate him or say some witty comeback about how it was finally time that he "womaned up" as Gogo liked to put it. He didn't, however, expect the look of disappointment that covered his features.

"Are you kidding me? Thanks Tadashi. Now I owe Fred money," he sighed upsettingly.

Tadashi stared down at his younger brother in disbelief, "You were in on that bet too?!"

"Heh heh, love ya big bro!" Hiro shouted before turning and booking it up the stairs. He stood there in disbelief before sighing and following Hiro's lead upstairs.

After all, it's not like he didn't expect that. Hiro missing out on a bet? Please, like that would ever happen.


	4. Chapter 4

**Oh my gosh guys I've been SOOOOOOOOOOOOO stressed! DX**

 **Honestly though, I can't even complain because it's 100% my fault and my fault alone that I'm stressed out this much. Basically (if you're wondering why I feel so stressed right now), I had two summer projects to do for school and ended up doing what I do best...**

 **Procrastinating.**

 **Yep, so that's my life right now. I have three books to read and two projects to complete before the 24th. Lord help me now!**

 **Anyways, here's chapter four for you all! I hope you're enjoying the story so far! And I hope that you all did your summer projects at the beginning of summer because I'm in my own little hell right now where I will sadly remain for the next two weeks. -.-**

 **Enjoy!**

 **DISCLAIMER: I do NOT own Big Hero 6 or any of its characters.**

* * *

It's been a week since Alex and Hiro first met, and they have been just about joint at the hip ever since. Hiro would always be leaving for hours on end to spend time with Alex, nearly missing his curfew here and there.

He felt bad for the few times that he walked in just as the clock struck 9:30, but he couldn't deny that it was 100% worth it to him. The reason he had been staying out later than usual is because Alex and him had this sort of ritual that they've been doing every night for the past couple of nights. At around 8 o'clock, they would sneak into the hotel on 34th Avenue, climb to the roof, and watch the stars together.

That place may have just started out as a good viewing spot of the stars and all of the city lights, but it quickly turned into him and Alex's sacred spot. Somewhere only they knew about and spent a lot of time together at. Nobody knew about it except for them. That was what made it so special.

One night however, Hiro seemed to lose track of time while stargazing. He was having such a good time that when he finally thought to check his phone for any messages, he realized that it was already 10:15.

"Crap!" Hiro jumped. A startled Alex jumped up along with him.

"What!?" she asked in a panic.

"I'm 45 minutes past curfew," he said quickly as he got all of his stuff together.

Alex looked at him in confusion, "It's already 10:15?"

"Yeah," he said looking down at her, "Don't you have a curfew as well?"

She chuckled lightly at this, "Nah, not really. I try not to stay out past 11 though. That's when all the crazy stuff tends to happen."

Hiro tilted his head questioningly, "So your parents just let you stay out as long as you want?"

She winced slightly at his words but smiled quickly in an attempt to cover it up. Hiro didn't buy it though. It may have crossed over her face faster than he could blink, but he definitely saw that hint of emotional pain, which subconsciously aroused a new suspicion inside of him.

Deciding to just let it go for now, mostly because he didn't really have time to sit and chat, he turned and made his way to the door.

"I really gotta go. You sure you're okay walking by yourself?" he asked, stopping at the door to wait for an answer.

"Yeah," she assured him, "I'll see you tomorrow Hiro."

"Alright, bye," he called as he opened the door and flew down the flight of stairs that led around the back of the building. He immediately booked it, hoping and praying that nobody would be there waiting for him with a lecture worthy of making his ears bleed.

After finally making it to the front door of the shop, he caught his breath and carefully unlocked the door, slowly pulled it open. He tried making as little noise as possible, and thought that he was doing a pretty good job.

"Where have you been?"

He was wrong.

Hiro jumped, whipping himself around with a hand thrown wildly to his chest. After seeing that it was just his brother, he sighed, "Geez Tadashi, you scared the living daylights out of me."

"You didn't answer the question," Tadashi pressed. One look at his face and Hiro knew he was in for it. He knew that Tadashi wasn't exactly angry with him or anything, just exhausted, disappointed, and worried.

Hiro couldn't really blame him though. The last time he stayed out past 10 was during his bot fighting days, which ended up getting him into some minor trouble with a biker. Fortunately, Hiro managed to bribe his way out of it, leaving him with just a few scrapes from being shoved around a bit. Although that didn't seem to relieve Tadashi in the slightest.

"Nothing, I was just hanging out with Alex," he replied, trying to ease his brother's nerves that he had been out doing something illegal again.

"I figured," Tadashi mumbled under his breath. "Look Hiro, I know you and Alex have become really good friends. And while I am happy for you and all, I can't help but feel that maybe you're spending a little too much time with her. I mean, first off, you were 45 minutes late tonight without even so much as sending me or Aunt Cass a quick text to let us know that you were okay. Secondly, there's a project due two weeks after the semester starts and you haven't even managed to think of an idea for it yet."

Hiro looked at the older male with a slightly taken back look.

"Wait a second," Hiro started, feeling a bit hurt, "are you saying that I can't hang out with her or anything?"

He watched his brother's face soften as he let out a long sigh, "No, of course not."

"Then what's the problem?" he asked genuinely confused. While most people would get extremely angry with their family trying to tell them what to do or who to hang out with, that wasn't the case with Hiro. No matter what Tadashi said, Hiro would always listen to his older brother. He had a great sense of respect for his brother and looks up to him like the father he never had. With that being said, it's understandable that Hiro wouldn't want Tadashi disapproving his first and only friend.

"Hiro, why were you so late tonight?" Tadashi asked after a short, tense silence.

"I just lost track of time. I'm sorry! I swear it won't happen again. Just please don't take this out on Alex or think poorly of her because I was late a few times. I promise we aren't doing anything bad, just hanging out," Hiro pleaded desperately.

Tadashi was surprised. Hiro rarely ever begs for things, and if he does, then whatever it is must be extremely important to him. His eyes then widened a bit as he made a sudden realization.

Hiro stared at him with wide eyes, waiting for his response. 'Tadashi can't hate Alex,' he thought to himself. He was about start twitching in anticipation before he heard, "Promise you'll stick to curfew from now on?"

"I swear!" Hiro shouted right away.

"Alright, but if you want to spend this much time with her I'd like to meet her soon," his brother said with a lopsided grin.

"Yes! Thanks Dashi! I was actually just talking to her about that today," he gleamed excitedly.

"Well, why don't you just invite her to music night on Saturday?" he suggested. "Then after we close up you can see if she wants to stay for dinner."

Hiro smiled at the idea, "That sounds awesome! I'll let her know tomorrow though. I'm going to bed now, I'm exhausted. Goodnight!"

"Night knucklehead!" he heard from behind him as he climbed up the stairs.

That was a close one. He can't slip up again. One more time and he'd be grounded; and Hiro has rarely ever been grounded.

When he walked into his and Tadashi's room, he kicked off his shoes before flopping down on his bed with a slight grunt. Too tired to move, he stripped down to his boxers and T-shirt, pulling the blankets over him, and turning out the lights.

He laid there staring at the dark ceiling for a total of about 30 seconds before reaching over and grabbing his phone. He searched through his short list of contacts until he found Alex's icon and clicked New Message.

 _Goodnight Alex_

After sending his quick message, he moved to put his phone back on the night stand but stopped when he felt it buzz.

 _Night Hiro 3_

Looking at the message, a dorky smile lit up his face and his cheeks began to flush. Shaking his head in an attempt to stop the unusual heat that he felt rise to his cheeks, he plugged his phone into the charger and set it on his night-stand.

He was then able to fall into a peaceful sleep filled with dreams of none other than his blonde hair, blue eyed best friend.

* * *

The next morning, Hiro was woken up at around 7 o'clock to the sound of his phone buzzing. He groggily reached over to his night-stand and snatched the annoying device up, dragging it with him back into the warmth of his bed.

He swiped to the left and answered, not even bothering to look at who it was.

"Hello?" he mumbled tiredly.

"Hey Hiro," Alex's voice called out from the other line, "Sorry, did I wake you up?"

At the sound of her voice, Hiro smiled softly and sat up. He rubbed his face in hopes of waking himself up a bit before replying.

"Kind of, I had to get up in a little while anyways," he shrugged, slipping out of bed and walking over to his computer to check his email.

He heard a small giggle as she replied, "Good. Anyways, the reason I called on this fine morning was for something extremely important."

Hearing the playful tone in her voice, Hiro smirked, "Oh yeah, who must we exterminate this time?"

"His name is Bond, James Bond."

"I've heard of him. He seems to be a worthy opponent."

"True, but Mr. Robotics Major has to have some sort of tech worthy of taking on the famous J.B."

Hiro laughed, "I highly doubt I would ever make it out of a fight with James Bond with anything less than two snapped arms."

"I don't know," she said thoughtfully, "I have faith in you. I think you can do it."

"I'm sure you do," Hiro replied sarcastically. "But really, what's up?"

"Right. Turns out I just so happened to snag two tickets to the Christmas festival they're holding downtown and was wondering if maybe you wanted to go with me tonight?" she asked hopefully.

"Sure, sounds fun," Hiro quickly agreed. "I just have to make sure I get home before 9:30 tonight. Tadashi caught me last night and wasn't too happy about it."

"Oh, of course! I understand. Sorry to keep you out so late by the way. Your family must not think too highly of me," she sighed dejectedly.

"Hey, don't say that!" Hiro exclaimed. "They don't hate you or anything. In fact, just last night Tadashi told me to invite you over for dinner on Saturday."

"Really?" Alex asked hopefully.

"Yeah, it's music night at my aunt's café and he said you should come and stay until dinner afterwards," Hiro said while spinning around in his chair, emails completely forgotten for the time being.

"I'd love to come!" she squealed in excitement. Hiro smiled at the thought of the million dollar smile that's probably spread across her face at the moment. It's an oddly satisfying feeling to see her happy. Whenever he sees her get excited over something small or laugh at one of his stupid jokes, he can't help the small bubble of pride that wells up in his chest along with feeling the intense need to keep that her happy. He never wanted to see her upset and he didn't think he could handle it if she ever cried. Just that thought alone made him uneasy.

"Great, then it's settled. I have to go and get started on a project for school now so I'll talk to you later. Text me when you're on your way there so I can leave alright?"

"Okay!" she chirped before hanging up.

Tossing his phone on his bed without a second glance, Hiro got to work thinking up an idea for his project.


	5. Chapter 5

**Ugh, school starts on Monday guys!**

 **That ugh may have seemed like I was displeased, but really I'm so excited I'm shaking gehe! Apparently I'm the only person that enjoys school and can't wait to go back because every time I talk to somebody else about going back to school, I can practically hear their souls crying out in anguish. Really though, I miss school. I miss feeling super productive and I REALLY miss getting out of the house and seeing my friends every day. Unfortunately, the friend I hang out with the most works strange hours pretty much every day so seeing her over the summer is really difficult D'X**

 **Anyways, here's chapter five for you guys! This chapter has some serious fluff in it, so be prepared :3**

 **Also, I skipped review responses last week because I forgot (teehee), so I just combined the two weeks here...**

 **REVIEWS:**

 _ **Momijifan Low-Ki:**_ Haha, yeah. Tadashi's love life is pretty steady throughout this story because he and Honey are super cute together :3. And how dare you trash talk Sharknado?! Sharknado is a cinematography masterpiece! Anyways, I can't tell you what's going on with Alex. That's a secret ;) You're just going to have to read to find out I guess XD I'm happy that you're interested in it though!

 _ **ParkerERoy13:**_ Thank you so much! Oh my gosh, your review made my day! I agree with you. I myself hate when authors leave their stories untouched for months on end. It practically eats away at me to not know what's going to happen next. That's why I tend to write my stories before posting them. Life is way too busy and unpredictable for me right now to have a set time to write weekly. It's nice to be able to take my time writing a story and end up producing something with quality instead of rushing and making something crappy and hard to read. But anyways, thank you again for the sweet review! I hope you continue to enjoy this story and stick around until the end. P.S. if you have been enjoying the cheese so far in this story, you're going to love this chapter XD

 ** _the22nddoctor:_** Thanks! I hope you stick around and continue to enjoy :D

 **So there you go guys! Thank you so much for all the awesome reviews! It really makes my day to read all the lovely things you have to say about my story :D I'm so happy that all of you are enjoying it so far and I hope that it stays that way throughout the whole story!**

 **Now, here's chapter five! I hope you guys enjoy!**

 **DISCLAIMER: I do NOT own Big Hero 6 or any of it's characters. The only character I own is Alex and if she resembles anybody in real life, it is simply by coincidence.**

* * *

"Wow!" Alex gaped as they walked into the festival together. Although Hiro has been to many amusement parks and festivals over the years with his brother and aunt, he has to admit that the amount of lights and decorations even sent him into a small state of awe.

Immediately when you walk in, you are greeted with the sight of an enormous Christmas tree that looked as if it had taken hours to set up and decorate. Standing tall behind that was a decent sized Ferris wheel surrounded by a bunch of smaller kiddy rides. Off to the right there was an archway covered in giant snowflakes and icy blue lights that trailed off towards a large palace that looked as if it was made completely out of ice. That alone was quite the sight to behold, but that wasn't even the half of it. Off to the left was a bunch of different gaming booths lined up in a single row with food and beverage booths sitting parallel to them. Past that was the boarding station for the small train that did rides around the entire lot in which people spent time preparing hundreds of Christmas lights and decorations that had been put up in honor of the festival.

"I have to say that I was not expecting it to look so professionally done," Hiro admitted with a childish grin on his face as he continued to stare at his surroundings in wonder.

"Tell me about it," Alex replied with wide eyes. "They definitely did some upgrades since the last time I came here."

"You've been to this festival before?" he asked her curiously after finally managing to peel his eyes away from all that was going on around them.

"Of course!" she replied enthusiastically. "You haven't? This is one of the most popular festivals in all of San Fransokyo!"

Hiro thought about it for a moment, "You know, surprisingly enough I haven't. With the amount of events my aunt Cass has dragged us to, you'd think that I would have come here at least once."

Alex just laughed.

"Well," she stated grabbing his wrist to pull him along behind her, "we have a lot to do then, don't we?"

Hiro stared down at the hand latched onto his wrist in a firm, yet gentle grip before he felt a sudden tingle run up his arm and down his spine. His eyes widen as he lets her drag him beneath the snowflake archway. He would probably be worried about the unfamiliar sensation if it weren't for the fact that it's not the first time it's happened.

While Hiro found this new feeling to be a strange one, it was even stranger how much Hiro liked it.

Shaking his thoughts away, he took control of his movements again and caught up to Alex's fast pace. He expected her to let go of his wrist now that he had caught up with her, but didn't complain when she kept her unwavering grip.

"So this is called the Ice Castle for obvious reasons," she stated with a childish smirk on her face. "While it's not cold enough here for them to have the outside built completely out of ice, the inside is 100% crystal wonderland!"

"Looks pretty 'cool'," Hiro remarked with a smirk. Alex's eyes quickly narrowed before she looked at him with a growing smile.

"I see what you did there," she stated knowingly. They both stared into each other's eyes before bursting out laughing at the cheesiness of the joke. When they finally reached the short line that would get them inside the building, they both tried to calm down their laughter to avoid the stares that were already starting to accumulate from the various people around them.

After a good five minutes of deep breathing, they had finally managed to get their idiotic laughter under control before falling into a comfortable silence.

It was that moment that Alex looked down and noticed that she was still holding onto Hiro's wrist. She immediately let go as a light wash of red presented itself across her cheeks, showing her embarrassment towards her actions.

"Sorry," she mumbled, staring down at her feet. Hiro looked at her in confusion when he felt the warmth of her hand leave his wrist. He then noticed her shy expression and how she was refusing to meet his gaze before his face began to flush as well.

In an act of courage, he reached over to her side and grabbed her hand in his own. Feeling the familiar tingling sensation, Hiro let out an inaudible sigh of relief as he intertwined their fingers together.

Alex's head snapped over to their connecting hands before turning back to the teen who was standing next to her.

"It's fine. I don't really mind," Hiro said with a soft smile.

He took a moment to take in her features under the baby blue lighting. He saw her beautiful, brightened blue eyes staring back at him, fully expressing the smile that spread across her face.

They both looked away from each other shyly as they stood there, hand-in-hand, waiting to get to the front of the line.

After another couple of minutes, they finally made it to the front. They simply showed the lady running the booth their all-access bracelets, which earned them a smile and a short "go ahead" as she lifted the rope to let them in.

"Finally!" Alex beamed excitedly. "I absolutely love this place!"

Hiro just shook his head in amusement, "Well, since I've never been here before it looks like you're going to have to give be the grand tour."

"Okay!" she quickly agreed!

Alex then proceeded to lead Hiro through the entire castle, showing him room after room of architectural genius. Knowing his brother's love for architecture, Hiro swore that if he ever had the chance, he had to show this place to Tadashi. He would have a blast.

* * *

"I can't believe the amount of detail there was! How long do you think it took them to build that?" Hiro asked as they walked through the exit of the Ice Castle. They'd spent about 45 minutes just walking around and taking everything in while Alex rambled on about different facts behind certain sculptures and what they were supposed to represent. Hiro nodded along the entire time, absorbing every word she said as if it were the last sip of water he'd ever take. He asked a few questions and made a few comments here and there, but mostly he would just listen to Alex.

And he didn't mind it one bit. He found himself growing incredibly fond of the sound of her voice.

"I'm not sure, but I doubt it was an over-night thing," she replied.

"True," he said.

"Hey, this may be a bit random, but are you hungry?" she asked, suddenly changing the subject.

"A little bit. Why? Are you?" he asked in return.

"Kind of. Oo! How about we go get some funnel cake," she suggested, pointing over to the funnel cake stand that she had spotted.

"That sounds perfect. Geez, I haven't had funnel cake in such a long time," Hiro said thoughtfully. The thought of the powdered sugar covered doughy goodness was enough to make his mouth water. Apparently, Alex felt the same way because he could practically see the hearts forming in her eyes as she looked over at the stand.

Hiro just sighed and started pulling her along.

"Come on, before you start drooling."

"Hey! I was not drooling," she exclaimed. Her brows furrowed before she wiped at her chin.

Just in case.

Hiro chuckled and continued over to the booth. Once Alex finished checking her chin for any drool that may have slipped out against her will, she noticed Hiro walking away and ran to catch up with him.

"Gee, thanks for ditching me in my moment of need," she mumbled. Hiro noticed that she finally saw he was gone and caught up to him.

"It's not my fault you weren't paying attention," Hiro stated jokingly. Alex gasped and slapped him playfully on the arm. "Hey, please refrain from damaging the merchandise."

"Oh yeah, it'd be a shame to make it look any worse than it already is," she smirked.

"Oh so you're going to be like that, huh? Well then, I guess I won't be sharing any of my funnel cake with you," he said casually as they reached the line.

"Please, you wouldn't leave me to starve," she scoffed. She frowned, "You wouldn't leave me to starve, would you?"

"I don't know. You really hurt my feelings with that last remark," he said, sarcasm evident in his voice. She stared at him with a totally un-amused look.

"Mmmhmmm," she mumbled dryly.

Hiro peaked over at her before sighing, "Fine, I guess if you're THAT hungry I can spare a small bite…"

"Hiro!"

He threw his hands up in surrender, "Kidding, kidding. Of course you can have some. Do you even need to ask?"

"Hmpf, I thought so," she said, crossing her arms. She suddenly jumped as she remembered something, "Oh! How much is it? I'll pay."

"No. No, no, no, no, no," Hiro states, grabbing her hand to stop her from reaching into her pocket. "There is no way you are paying. I'll handle it."

"Hiro, it's fine. I brought plenty of money with me so it's no big deal. Besides, you paid for both of our admissions so it's only fair."

"Nope," he stated firmly. "I'm paying and that's final."

She stood there looking at him through narrow eyes before giving in with a sigh.

"Fine, but I'm paying for hot cocoa," she declared.

They then reached the window where the extremely unenthusiastic worker asked them what they'd like.

"Oo, can we get a funnel cake with strawberries on top?" she asked Hiro in excitement. Knowing that strawberries were one of Alex's favorite foods, Hiro couldn't possibly deny her request.

"Sure, why not? One strawberry funnel cake with whipped cream please," he ordered as he pulled out a twenty dollar bill from his wallet. He handed the lady the money and waited for his change. Once he was done paying, the lady turned around and began putting their pastry together.

"So after we eat I say we head over to the boarding station for the train and then hit up some of the gaming booths," Alex suggested, leaning against the counter.

"Okay, but what about the Ferris wheel?" he asked curiously.

"Oh, we have to save that for last," she said as if it were obvious.

"Why? Are you scared of heights or something?" he inquired.

"Not at all; in fact, I love heights. The reason that we have to wait for that is because they're doing a firework show at 8 and watching the fireworks from way up there would be pure awesomeness!"

"I guess that does make sense," he said. The employee served them their plate of food. Hiro grabbed it and made his way over to one of the unoccupied benches around the lot, slowing down to make sure Alex was behind next to him.

They shared their plate of food while talking about random nonsense. They sat there talking for about 30 minutes before deciding to head over to the train area.

After waiting in yet another long line, they boarded onto one of the seats on the train and awaited its departure. Considering this wasn't a real train or anything and was intended for children and maybe a few parents here and there, it was a pretty tight fit. It wasn't that big of a deal however. It gave Hiro and Alex a reason to be close to each other, so neither complained too much.

They spent the next couple of hours checking out all of the décor, playing some games, and trying various different free samples from the vendors. When they ran out of things to do, they ended up just sitting down on one of the benches to talk. Their conversation wasn't really about anything specific. The topics of discussion ranged anywhere from favorite pizza flavors to some more slightly personal questions. What made Hiro suspicious, however, was the way that Alex seemed to try and avoid answering any questions relating to her family. Sure, she knew basically everything there is to know about his family, but he has yet to hear a single thing about hers.

He was about to say something about his concerns before he saw her look at her watch with large eyes. She slapped him on the arm and abruptly stood up.

"Ow! What was that for?" he asked, rubbing his abused arm.

"It's ten to eight and we aren't even in line for the Ferris wheel!" she exclaimed frantically. Hiro looked down at his watch and silently cursed.

"Crap," he muttered. "Well, what are you waiting for? Let's go!"

They both booked it in the direction of the large wheel, hoping that the line wasn't too crazy.

Right as they were nearing the surprisingly short line, they noticed a group of about 15 teens heading in the same direction as them.

"We've gotta beat em'!" Alex declared, pushing herself to run even harder than before. Luckily, Hiro had mastered the art of fast-paced running after his few years of almost getting beaten to a bloody pulp in bot fighting. Due to this, he was easily able to keep up with his best friend's speed.

The other teens however, noticed their increase in speed and one of them made bolted for the next spot in line.

It was a close call, but Alex and Hiro managed to make it just in the nick of time. The other guy stopped and let out a "Damn it!" before walking back over to his friends who depressingly got in line behind the two victors.

"Yes!" Alex shouted victoriously. Hiro just sat there quietly for a second as he tried to catch his breath. He may be a fast sprinter, but that doesn't mean that he has the stamina of a god or anything.

"Ho-how are you… not out of breath," he managed between heavy breaths. Seriously, she wasn't even sort of winded.

"Meh," she shrugged, "I used to be in cross country so that was barely anything to me."

She gave him a huge grin while holding up a peace sign as if to mock him.

"Yeah, just rub it in why don't you," Hiro mumbled, finally catching his breath.

"Hey don't take it out on me because you have horrible stamina," she muttered in defense. He gave her a quick glare, but all she did was continue to smile before turning to the lady at the front of the line.

"Can I see your tickets?" she asked monotonously.

Alex just held up her wrist, elbowing the boy next to her lightly to get him to do the same, "We have wristbands."

"Alright, you can go. Next!" she called, completely disregarding their existence. Alex and Hiro gave each other a quick look before shrugging and heading over to the next available gondola.

Hiro jumped in first, turning around and reaching out to help Alex up the large step. She gladly accepted bring pulled into the small seated area. She thanked him, patting the spot next to her for Hiro to sit in. He was just going to sit across from her but thought, "Why not?" and took her up on her offer.

Once they were all settled, they saw a man come up and close the door before the wheel started to rotate, sending them up to the next stopping point.

"Well," Alex started as she looked at the time on her phone, "we still have four minutes which should be plenty of time to get us to a good firework-viewing height."

"Mhm," Hiro agreed. "They start at 8, right?"

"Yep," she answered. "Hey Hiro?"

"Yeah?" he replied looking down at her. His smile slipped when he noticed her staring down at her lap where she was twiddling her thumbs nervously.

"Hey," he said in concern, "are you okay? You're not actually scared of heights are you?"

Alex then looked up to see his big, brown eyes staring back at her. She felt almost hypnotized for a second, before snapping out of it and rolling her eyes playfully.

"No. I already told you, I love heights," she said.

"Well then, what is it?" he asked worriedly.

"It's just," she started before pausing. After a few seconds of silence she continued, "I just wanted to say thank you."

"Thank you?" he asked in confusion. "Is this about the funnel cake again? I already told you, it was no big deal."

"No, no this isn't about the funnel cake. Although I still owe you a hot chocolate," she said. He was about to object but was stopped by the death glare that she sent his way, "Don't even try to argue."

Hiro quickly zipped his lip and nodded, allowing her to continue was she was saying.

"I meant, thank you for hanging out with me. I know I can be slightly weird sometimes and maybe not all that girly, but you don't seem to care. I haven't ever really had such a good friend that I can rely on before so it's kind of weird to be starting now, but I know I'll get the hang of it eventually," she said softly.

Hiro looked at her with wide eyes. He thought over those words in his head before asking, "What brought all this up?"

"Well," she said as she shrunk back slightly in her seat, "I know you've been getting curious as to why I don't talk about my family much and I didn't want you to think that I was keeping secrets or anything. I'm just not ready to talk about it yet. It's not that I don't trust you, because I do. I trust you more than anyone."

As Hiro stared down at the person before him, he saw something that hasn't seen before: a shy, insecure girl who seemed confused in who she could trust in this world. In the two weeks that he's known her, he's never seen anything other than her fun, easy-going personality. That's why it came as such a shock that she actually had this side to her. Hiro knew from experience that everybody had their own demons; he just didn't want to believe that Alex wasn't any different from everybody else.

Without even the slightest bit of hesitation, Hiro reached over and pulled Alex into a tight hug.

She was shocked at first, but eventually melted into it, wrapping her arms around his torso.

"You can always count on me," Hiro whispered into her neck. A shiver ran up Alex's spine, but she smiled none-the-less. She nodded in response as they continued to sit there in each other's arms.

After what felt like eternity, both jumped apart when they heard a loud explosion over-head. Their heads whipped around towards the window on the side of the cart to find what that sudden noise had come from.

Alex gasped when she saw its source, "The fireworks!" She scooted all the way over to the window and stared out with a childish grin on her face.

Hiro smiled gently at her before coming back to his senses and scooting over to look at the exploding lights in the sky. He could have easily just moved to the bench across from the one Alex was on to look out the other window, but that thought didn't even cross his mind as he pressed himself against Alex's back to look over her shoulder.

Alex stiffened when she felt a pressure against her back, but quickly once seeing Hiro's face in her peripheral. Her face reddened as she looked at the fireworks again with a goofy smile on her face. She then subconsciously leaned back into Hiro's chest, earning a satisfied grin from said teen.

He wrapped his reassuring arms protectively around her waist and rested his chin on her shoulder as they finished the night off by watching the colorful explosions light up the night sky.


	6. Chapter 6

**Holy cow guys.**

 **Just holy cow.**

 **Now, I know I didn't update yesterday and I'm sorry for that. Just know, however, that if I ever don't update on Friday (like I am supposed to), I will most certainly do it on Saturday. The only reason I was late this week was due to a wonderful thing called school. Oh yes, the magical and wondrous place that we all know, love, and old dearly in our hearts.**

 **Note to sarcasm.**

 **Don't get me wrong, I love school. It's a great place where you get to learn and be with anybody other than the family you've been trapped with all summer. The only thing I wasn't anticipating this year was the workload though. Oh my gosh! The workload! Guys, I am not exaggerating when I tell you that I have a good three hours (at least) of homework each night. THREE HOURS! This is mostly due to the fact that I am taking two AP classes, one of which is taught by a teacher who refuses to teach so I'm all by myself on that one ;-; Plus, I have all honors and 2 online classes. So by the end of my 8-class schedule for the day, all I really have time for is homework and sleep. This week had just been so stressful and overwhelming since I'm still getting used to the amount of work, which is why I was a little late updating.**

 **I'll try to keep my schedule to Friday's guys, but if I do change it to Saturday's I shall let you know beforehand so you're aware and not wanting to strangle me every week.**

 **Anyways, here's chapter six! I hope you guys enjoy it! This one gets a tad more serious towards the end, so I hope you enjoy that as well ;D**

 **REVIEWS:**

 _ **Momijifan Low-Ki:**_ I can definitely say that nobody in this story is with the mob. I shall not say anything else on the matter though. P.S. I guess I will respect your views on the masterpiece, otherwise known as Sharknado ;)

 _ **ParkerERoy13:**_ I'm glad you liked it! And thank you so much :D

 **DISCLAIMER: I do not own Big Hero 6 or any of it's characters. I only own my original character, Alex, and if she seems like se represents any real person, then it is simply by coincidence. ALSO, I do not own the song "The Only Exception". That song is owned and copyrighted by Paramore.**

* * *

"Tadashi! Have you seen my red flannel anywhere?" Hiro called out to his older brother as he scoured the room in search of his missing shirt.

He'd been running around like a chicken without a head for the past ten minutes as his older brother sat back on his bed, flipping through a magazine with an amused expression on his face.

"You're holding it Hiro," Tadashi stated bluntly as he turned to the next page of _Scientific American_.

Hiro's head snapped down to look at his hands as he realized that he'd been clutching onto the red and black piece of fabric the whole time. He sighed and mentally slapped himself before quickly peeling off his old, white T-shirt to replace it with the nicer article of clothing.

He rolled up the sleeves and grabbed a pair of jeans and put on. Considering it was pretty cold outside, he had decided against wearing his usual khaki shorts and instead went with some longer, dark blue jeans.

"Wow," Tadashi said impressed, "Why don't you ever dress this nice when you're with me or Aunt Cass?"

Hiro completely ignored him as he checked himself over in the mirror. After playing around with his too-messy-to-be-tamed hair for a few seconds, he gave up with an aggravated sigh and turned around to face his brother.

"How do I look?" Hiro asked worriedly. Tadashi chuckled in response, looking over his little brother's form for any potentially embarrassing mishaps in his outfit.

"Other than your zipper being down, I think you're good little bro," Tadashi noted with an innocent expression.

"What?!" Hiro exclaimed, looking down at the zipper on his jeans. He saw his zipper pulled up and turned to the older boy with a glare, "Tadashi!"

"Sorry! I couldn't help it," he apologized with his hands up in surrender.

Hiro rolled his eyes and turned back to his desk to check his phone for any new messages. Tadashi raised a brow as he watched the boy's actions, "Why are you stressing out over this so much? You've hung out with her nearly every night for the past two weeks. Tonight's just like any of those other nights', right?"

"No," Hiro immediately disagreed, "it's not. We don't usually hang out with other people. It's always just the two of us. Plus, you guys are meeting her for the first time; of course I'd be a little nervous."

He had a point. He knew that Hiro had grown extremely close to this girl in the past couple of weeks and can understand why he'd be slightly anxious about tonight's plans. All this made Tadashi feel a bit bad about what he had implied when he had busted Hiro for coming home late that one night. He didn't want his little brother to think that he didn't approve of his friend because that wasn't the case at all. He was just curious as to what this girl was like. All he really knew about her was that she was blonde with blue eyes, had a nose piercing, and was named Alex. That's not really much to go on, which only increased Tadashi's curiosity towards the girl that his little brother had been spending all of his time with.

"Don't worry," he assured Hiro, "we won't embarrass you too much. I promise."

Knowing that was the best he was going to get out of the older Hamada, Hiro just sighed in slight relief, "Thank you."

"Yeah, yeah," Tadashi said, throwing the magazine onto his nightstand, "So, what time is Alex coming?"

"Well, she said she was on her way fifteen minutes ago so she should be here soon," he replied, finally being able to sit down on his desk chair and relax for a moment. "She said she'd text me when she was outsi-"

His eyes suddenly turned to his phone as it let out a loud beep. He looked at the screen before jumping out of his seat and making his way towards the door.

"She's here," he said quickly as he exited the room.

Tadashi rolled his eyes before calmly getting off of his bed and following Hiro down to the café.

When Hiro walked into the café, he looked around for a familiar mop of blonde hair. As he was looking, his aunt rushed over carrying a plate of a multitude of different pastries and a few dishes filled with actual food.

"Hey hon, when's Alex coming?" she asked him as she placed a dish of wings on one of the near-by tables. "We only have a few hours until we close; I thought she was coming for Music Night."

"She is. She said she's here so I'm trying to find her," he muttered absent-mindedly as he scanned the large crowd that had accumulated for the special event being held tonight. Before she could even reply, Hiro had weaseled his way into the crowd as he made his way towards the other side of the café.

Cass just shook her head and made her way over to the counter where some people were waiting in line to purchase something to go.

As she was ringing them up, she noticed her older nephew make his appearance. He scanned the crowd and made his way over to the front counter once he spotted his aunt ringing up a few customers.

"Hey Aunt Cass," he greeted. "Where'd Hiro go?"

"Went to look for Alex," she said as she gave the customer his change. "Oh, I'm so excited to finally meet her!"

Tadashi was about to say something when he caught his brother's distinct hair making its way towards them out of the corner of his eye. He turned to Aunt Cass and said, "Well, get ready them because here they come."

They both turned around right when Hiro came out of the crowd with another person in tow. Standing next to him was a petite girl, no taller than 5'2, with shoulder length dirty blonde hair and the brightest blue eyes they have ever seen. She wore a simple white blouse with black skinny jeans and grey converse. As expected, there was a small, diamond stud pierced into her right nostril. While Tadashi has never liked the idea of facial piercings, he had to admit that it suited her nicely.

Hiro pulled Alex along by the hand, only stopping once they reached the front counter. Tadashi was the first to notice that despite escaping from the small crowd of people surrounding the area in which the performers were setting up, both teen's hands remained firmly interlocked. Aunt Cass was quick to pick up on this and exchanged a quick look with Tadashi before speaking up.

"Hi! You must be Alex," she greeted with a welcoming smile on her face. The blonde looked at the woman before her and gave a small smile of her own.

"Yeah," she replied. She may have been trying to seem calm and collected on the outside, but on the inside she was freaking out. Hiro is an important person to her and she didn't want his family to hate her or anything.

Hiro seemed to have sensed her discomfort because she felt his hand squeeze hers in an attempt to calm her nerves. She took a deep breath before beginning to speak.

"You're Tadashi and Ms. Cassidy right? I've heard a lot about you guys," Alex asked politely.

"Oh honey, just call me Aunt Cass. Any friend of Hiro's is a friend of mine!" she exclaimed, pulling Alex into a side-hug. She stiffened for a second at the sudden contact, but immediately relaxed and returned the hug with one arm.

Once Aunt Cass had released her from her death grip, she turned to Tadashi. Her smile turned into one of hesitation as she let go of Hiro's hand momentarily reached out to shake his hand.

"It's nice to finally meet you Tadashi. Hiro's always talking about how awesome of a big brother you are," she said, a tinge of nervousness reflecting in her voice. She knew how important Tadashi was in Hiro's life and definitely didn't want to do anything to embarrass herself in front of him.

Tadashi took notice in the girl's slightly shy behavior and smiled a bit. He could already tell that he didn't have to worry about her being a bad influence on Hiro or anything. She actually seems quite respectful. More than Hiro that is…

Well, job #1 is complete then! Now, moving on to job #2…

"It's nice to meet you too," he said as he shook her hand firmly. "While I'm touched that my little brother has said so much about me, I have to say that you have me beat in that category."

Her eyebrows scrunched together as she tilted her head to the side like a confused puppy.

"Excuse me?" she asked. Tadashi noticed Hiro standing next to her with wide eyes mouthing words such as "shut up" or "I'm going to kill you", but he just decided to ignore him. He smirked and looked directly at Alex.

"I've heard a LOT about you as well. Hiro's always going on about the oh-so-famous Alex and how amazing you are. You should really take that as a compliment. Hiro rarely ever thinks about people so much to which he can talk about them for 45 minutes straight."

Hiro harshly glared at Tadashi as he spoke, giving himself a good face-palm at the end. No wonder Hiro has so little friends. Well, this just goes to show that you can always rely on your family to embarrass you.

"Really?" she asked softly. Hiro looked up at the sound of her voice and was met with her gentle stare. She smiled gratefully at Hiro, a light blush decorating her cheeks.

"Yeah," he said as he looked down at his shoes with a sheepish grin on his face. He rubbed the back of his neck awkwardly, causing Alex to laugh a bit at the nervous gesture.

"So," Aunt Cass started, "do you go to school around here Alex?"

"Yeah, I go to San Fransokyo School of Fine Arts," she replied. Hiro then led her over to a bar stool at the counter where they both sat down side-by-side.

"Really?" Tadashi asked. "Isn't that school right down the street from SFIT?"

"Yeah," she replied.

"What are you studying there?" Aunt Cass asked as she rang up yet another customer.

"Singing and composing; you're usually only there for one or the other but I write my own songs so I get the best of both worlds."

Aunt Cass immediately lit up at these words, "Can you play an instrument?"

"Of course," Alex replied with a proud smile, "I can play the piano, guitar, both electric and acoustic, and the violin."

"You can play the violin?" Hiro asked, shocked that he never knew this information.

"Yeah," she said. "Sorry, I must have never mentioned it before."

Aunt Cass let out a squeal of delight which startled Hiro along with his brother and female companion.

"This is perfect! How would you like to perform tonight? Some guy who was supposed to be playing three or four songs called in sick and without him we have to close early. If you'd be willing, I could just have you stand in for him."

"Yeah, that's be so cool!" Hiro agreed. He found it slightly strange that he has been by Alex's side for two weeks straight, yet he hasn't heard her sing even once.

"Sure!" Alex complied willingly. "I just wrote a few new songs too so I guess I could perform those for you. Do you have any instruments that I can use?"

"Of course! Follow me," Aunt Cass said before leading Alex towards the closet near the "stage" to show her where they kept the instruments they use for music night.

Realizing they were alone, Hiro quickly turned to Tadashi with a hopeful, yet slightly hesitant, expression on his face. Tadashi saw this and furrowed his brows at his younger brother's expression.

"So?" Hiro dragged on expectantly.

"Yes?" Tadashi asked calmly with a raised brow.

"Don't yes me, just answer the question!" Hiro exclaimed.

"You never asked a question," Tadashi replied with a smirk. Hiro groaned loudly, sending a small glare in his brother's direction.

"Just tell me what you think of Alex," Hiro stated firmly. He stared at his brother, anticipating his response. Tadashi absolutely had to like Alex. He doesn't know what he would do if his brother disapproved of his friend.

Tadashi looked down at his brother's face, and a gentle smile began to play at his lips. He never thought he'd see the day that his little, socially naïve brother would grow to have these types of feelings for a girl. Hiro thinks he's embarrassing now, but he hasn't even seen half of that Tadashi has up his sleeve.

"She seems like a sweet girl," Tadashi admitted truthfully. "Honestly, I thought she was going to be a lot different, but she pleasantly surprised me. Whenever you plan on growing a pair and asking her out, just know that I 100% approve."

"Wha-what?! What are you talking about?" Hiro stuttered out bewilderedly. Tadashi mentally laughed at the dark red hue that spread across Hiro's cheeks

"What's got you looking like a tomato?" Alex asked as she suddenly reappeared beside the two Hamada brothers. Hiro jumped when he saw the blonde's face appear from seemingly nowhere. After noticing that it was her, his blush only deepened before he looked down at his shoes as if they were the most interesting things in the world.

"Nothing," he murmured incoherently. He wanted to glare at his brother who was currently clutching his gut laughing, but was too busy momentarily refusing to look anybody in the eye.

"You're lying," she stated, poking Hiro's cheek in emphasis.

When Tadashi managed to calm down his laughter, a smirk replaced his humorous smile, "Actually, Hiro and I were just talking about his undying lo-"

He was immediately cut off by Hiro jumping over to him and slapping a hand over his mouth.

"His undying what?" Alex asked suspiciously. She looked over at Aunt Cass for a possible answer, but she shrugged, just as lost as Alex was.

"Nothing!" Hiro replied over-enthusiastically. "Come on, let's go find a seat and listen to some music!" He reached over and grabbed Alex's hand, dragging her off before his brother could continue to ruin his life.

"What was all that about?" Aunt Cass asked Tadashi as Hiro and Alex disappeared into the crowd.

"I think Hiro's got a little crush," Tadashi said with an amused smirk. He saw his aunt's eyes light up like an LED light bulb. She let out a small squeal of delight and started to go on about how cute Alex and Hiro would be together. He just shook his head with a small chuckle before pulling on an apron and moving to help Aunt Cass out with the over-crowded bakery.

"Why are you acting so weird?" Alex asked as her and Hiro finally found an empty table to sit down at.

"Don't worry about it. It was just my brother being an idiot," Hiro said like it was no big deal.

"Okay..." Alex trailed off in confusion. "Anyways, I'll be performing in about an hour or so."

"Oh yeah! By the way, why is it that I've never heard you sing before?" Hiro asked curiously.

Alex just shrugged in response, "I don't know. Why is it that I've never seen your lab before?"

Hiro thought about this for a second before letting out a simple, "Touché."

"You know, considering you are about to hear me sing tonight, I say that it's only fair that I get to see your lab," she said, leaning back in her seat with a knowing look on her face. Not many people have seen Hiro's lab, but he wouldn't be against bringing Alex there someday soon.

"I wouldn't mind," Hiro said. "I have two though, so do you want to see my lab in the garage or my lab at school?"

"Why not both?" she asked excitedly. She may not be a super genius or anything like Hiro was, but she's always found a bunch of the different fields of science interesting. Fortunately, one of these fields just so happened to be robotics.

"Alright. How about tomorrow you come over and see the magic that goes on in the garage and on Monday you can just walk over to SFIT and I'll give you a grand tour," he suggested.

"Awesome! I can't wait," she exclaimed with a large smile on her face.

Hiro smiled at her in return, happy to see that she was happy.

They spent the 30 minutes or so talking and joking around before Tadashi joined in on the conversation.

Soon enough, it was time for Alex to go up and perform.

"The last set just finished. I have to go now," Alex said as she got up, making sure to push in her chair and grab her trash to throw away on the way over to the performing area.

"Alright, you go get set up and we'll be there in a minute. Good luck," Hiro said as he sent her a reassuring smile. Alex accepted it gratefully before making her way over to the supply closet that Aunt Cass had showed her earlier.

"I wonder if she's any good," Tadashi commented as they threw their trash away. Once they dumped the food wrappers into the trash can, they began to weave through the crowd to get as close to the stage as possible.

"I'm sure she is," Hiro commented, "I mean, she isn't in a school studying music for nothing."

They quite easily made it to the front of the crowd and managed to snag a table right in front of the "stage".

They sat in a comfortable silence for a few seconds before Alex walked up onto the stage with a guitar in hand.

"Hey everybody!" she called out to the average sized crowd. A mix of "hey's" and "hi's" rang out through the mass of people, causing a smile to light up her face.

"So, I wasn't really supposed to be performing tonight, but the guy that was couldn't make it so I'll be filling in for him. I hope you enjoy!" she said.

Hiro couldn't help but notice some people losing interest after her small speech and others (A.K.A. the group of teenage boys sitting in the corner) gawking at her like a piece of meat. This gave Hiro a sickening feeling in the pit of his stomach. Something about the way those guys were looking at her made him want to go over there and rip their eyes out.

Hiro just shrugged this feeling off though, focusing his attention on the music that began to ring out through the room.

 _When I was younger, I saw my daddy cry  
And curse at the wind  
He broke his own heart and I watched  
As he tried to reassemble it_

Hiro's smile faltered after hearing the first verse of the song. He noticed the look that came over her face when she started to sing. It was a look of pain and regret. Most people probably wouldn't be able to notice it, but he did. And he didn't like it one bit.

 _And my momma swore  
That she would never let herself forget  
And that was the day that I promised  
I'd never sing of love if it does not exist _

After the second verse, Tadashi was able to notice that something wasn't right. Alex wasn't just singing a song. These weren't just some random words that had been thrown together as lyrics because they rhymed and sounded nice with a beat. No, these words meant something. The look on Alex's face told Tadashi that this song meant something very important and were very real for her to her. It seems that Hiro wasn't the only one to notice the emotion that flashed across her face as she performed. Tadashi frowned as he thought about what the inspiration behind this song may be.

 _But darling, you are the only exception  
You are the only exception  
You are the only exception  
You are the only exception_

As she was singing the chorus, Alex quickly glanced over at Hiro. Truth was, she was beginning to like him. Not in a "we're best friends" kind of way either, but in a way that she knew would never work out. Even if it did, would Hiro really want her like that?

 _Maybe I know, somewhere deep in my soul  
That love never lasts  
And we've got to find other ways to make it alone  
Or keep a straight face_

 _And I've always lived like this  
Keeping a comfortable distance  
And up until now I had sworn to myself that I'm content with loneliness  
Because none of it was ever worth the risk_

After going over these lines that she poured heart and soul into, Alex realized just how true they were. Why should she even kid herself with the idea of falling for Hiro? She would only be disappointing the most important person in her life and honestly, her own happiness wasn't worth that risk.

 _Well you are the only exception  
You are the only exception  
You are the only exception  
You are the only exception_

At this point in the song, Hiro and Tadashi were riveted. It was amazing to them how much emotion a person could push through in a single song.

 _I've got a tight grip on reality  
But I can't let go of what's in front of me here  
I know you're leaving in the morning when you wake up  
Leave me with some kind of proof it's not a dream, oh_

As she sung the chorus, Alex cursed herself for even choosing this song to begin with. What had she been thinking? This song brought up so many unwanted memories and feeling, but she felt as if she had to get it off her chest. To who? She didn't know. But she did know that as she finished up the last couple of lines, she felt as though a weight had been lifted off her chest and she could finally breathe again.

 _And I'm on my way to believing  
Oh, and I'm on my way to believing_

Once she finished she took a deep breath and looked out at the crowd. She didn't get any jaw-dropping round of applause like in the movies, but she did seem to get her message across as she looked into the only set of eyes that mattered.

After a few seconds of staring into each other's eyes, Hiro smiled and clapped along with everybody else. Alex smiled a tight smile before giving a slight bow and prepared for her next song.

The rest of the night went by smoothly as Alex finished up her set. Aunt Cass closed up the restaurant shortly after that and the four of them made their way upstairs to have dinner together.

Alex didn't know if it was a mistake to get so close to the Hamada's like this. All she knew was that this was the first time in a very long time that she's felt as if she was a part of a family and even if it was a selfish thing to do, she would enjoy it while it lasts.

As she sat down at the table with Hiro, Tadashi, and Aunt Cass, she realized just how much she missed this. She missed having people to joke around with. She missed being around people who cared. She missed having people she could rely on. And most of all, she missed being a part of something bigger.

'If this is a mistake,' she thought to herself, 'then this is the best mistake I've ever made.'


	7. Chapter 7

**Sooooooo...**

 **I've decided to start updating on Saturdays instead of Fridays. I know, I'm sorry, but I'm just so busy on Friday's and by the time I get to actually sit down with my laptop to update, I'm freaking exhausted. So, instead I've just made up my mind to update on Saturdays instead.**

 **Other than that tidbit of information, nothing necessarily new is going on. It's Labor Day weekend which is exciting I guess. The best part about it is that it's my best friend's 18th birthday on Monday! WOO! We're going to party hardy XD Other than that, nothing exciting going on haha!**

 **Anyways, I'm sure you guys are just here for the story so I won't bore you to tears with my social life. This chapter kind of dives into some of the questions I've been getting in regards to the secrets behind Alex. There are a few more clues in this chapter, so I hope you enjoy them because I'm not telling you guys anything :D**

 **REVIEWS:**

 _ **Momijifan Low-Ki:**_ Yes, it was a Paramore song! And it kind of does give a little tiny bit of a hint about Alex's life. Although, not too much. I wouldn't want to give anything away, now would I? ;)

 **DISCLAIMER: I do NOT own Big Hero 6 or any of its characters. I only own my OC, Alex, and if she seems to represent anybody in real life, it is purely by coincidence!**

* * *

It was about 7 A.M. when Hiro woke up the next day. He thought about texting Alex but decided against it, not wanting to risk waking her up so early. Instead, he threw some clothes on and headed down to the garage to get some work done on his project.

He has three more weeks to work on it and is almost done with the blue-prints. All he has left to do is work out some small kinks before he can start creating it, so he figured he might as well get that over with due to his body deciding to randomly wake him up at this ungodly hour of the morning. Besides, after this all he has to do is create it which is a piece of cake.

The end result was him sitting in his garage for a 3 solid hours, swiveling back and forth on his rolling chair to type away on his computers.

At 10 o'clock, he heard a knocking sound on the garage door. Knowing that Aunt Cass was the only one to knock, he figured that she was bringing him some breakfast like she usually does when him or Tadashi are working on projects.

"Just leave the plate on the work bench Aunt Cass," he said absentmindedly as he continued to work, not even bothering to look up from his renovated computer.

"Try again," he heard the distinct voice that clearly wasn't Aunt Cass. He whipped around in his seat and saw none other than Alex leaning against the side of the garage door clad in a pair of dark skinny jeans and a Linkin Park T-shirt.

"You didn't answer your phone and I was promised a tour of your garage," she said with a smirk on her face.

"Oh, yeah! Sorry, I've been working all morning," he apologized. He then rolled himself away from his desk to stretch out his arms.

"It's cool, I understand," she said before moving to stand up straight. "Can I come in?"

"Of course," Hiro said as he stood up and cleared off the couch. It wasn't really messy or anything. There were just a couple blankets thrown on it from this morning. He tried to keep his lab clean to avoid any issues with losing things. While it wasn't as organized as Wasabi's station, it was quite clean for being managed by a 15-year-old teenage boy.

Alex accepted his words of approval as she made her way into the room with a plate balanced on her right hand.

"Aunt Cass gave me some cookies to bring down to you for breakfast," she said as she placed the plate in front of him before plopping down on the couch.

"Thanks," he said as he picked one up and bit into it. He was about to finish typing the sentence he was working on, but grabbed a cookie and handed it to Alex first.

"Thank you," she mumbled before taking a bite. As she chewed on the chunk of chocolate-chippy goodness, she decided to take that moment to scope out the room.

"Wow," she gasped in awe. She stood up and walked over to the wall of mechanical inventions on the far side of the room. Hiro noticed her interest in his older pieces of work and got up out of his chair to follow her.

"Did you make all of these?" she asked in astonishment.

"Yep," Hiro said full of pride. "Most of these are old though. I keep all of the newer stuff in my lab at SFIT."

"That's so cool!" she said excitedly as she scanned the shelf. Her eyes landed on the red and black container on the floor. "What's that?"

"Oh, that? That's Baymax. Tadashi made him, but he's really helpful so Tadashi gave me one to keep here just in case of anything," Hiro replied as he looked down at the case.

"What does he do?" she asked in wonder.

Hiro smirked, "Here, I'll show you."

"Oka- Ow! Why did you pinch me?" she asked with a slight glare. She wound up slug him in the arm, but stopped when she heard the sound of a balloon inflating. She quickly turned her attention from the pinching-culprit next to her to the life-sized marshmallow that now stood in front of her.

"Hello. I am Baymax, your personal healthcare companion."

"Health care companion?" she asked hesitantly, looking over at Hiro to silently ask if this was safe. He just smiled and nodded his head in the direction of his brother's most successful invention.

"I was activated by your call of distress. On a scale of one to ten, how would you rate your pain?" Baymax asked in his robotic voice.

"Uhh," Alex sputtered, "a one I guess. It was just a pinch."

"I will scan you for any injuries now."

"What?! No! No, no, no, stop that," she said trying to slap a hand over where his mouth would be if he were a person.

It was useless however because Baymax easily continued with a, "Scan complete."

"Really?" she whined. Hiro raised a questioning brow at Alex's strange behavior.

"Sorry, but he scans everybody. It's not that big a deal and he won't tell anybody about your personal information except for Tadashi and me," Hiro said.

"Great," she said with a huff as her shoulders slumped in defeat.

Suddenly, a diagram of the human body lit up on Baymax's midsection. Before Alex could do anything to stop it, red marks appeared along the torso and one of the shoulders of the diagram.

"I can detect subcutaneous bruising in the abdomen and left shoulder. I would recommend icing the bruised areas for 15 minutes every hour to reduce swelling."

Hiro snapped his attention to Alex who was currently in the process of face-palming.

"Alex?" he asked in a worried tone.

"It's really not that big of a deal," she said convincingly, "my cat walked in front of me when I was going down the stairs and I tripped. Really, I'm fine."

Hiro narrowed his eyes slightly at the girl next to him, "Okay…"

"Anyways, I'm fine Baymax. Thanks for the advice. You can deactivate now," she said with a tight smile.

"I cannot deactivate until you say you are satisfied with your care," Baymax replied.

"Okay then, I'm satisfied with my care," she said rushedly. She had to force down a sigh of relief when he shrunk back down into his case. "A marshmallow nurse?"

"Tadashi was going for a huggable design," Hiro noted with a shrug.

"He's a bit pushy, but how could you not find a him huggable?" she asked as if it were obvious.

Hiro noticed her attempts at changing the subject but wouldn't have any of it, "Are you okay?"

"Huh?" she asked as she shoved the rest of the cookie in her mouth. In between chews she managed, "Mwha are talkin bout?"

"The bruises, do they hurt?" he asked in concern. He doesn't like that she's just blowing them off like they were no big deal. If they were no big deal, Baymax wouldn't have detected them in his routine scan.

"Nah, don't worry about it. I'm a tough cookie!" she said with a bright smile. Hiro just stared at her for a few moments before shaking his head and grabbing her hand to drag her back over to the couch.

While this confused Alex, she didn't say a word as Hiro pushed her down onto the couch cushion and made his way over to the custom mini-fridge that sat in the corner of the room. He reached inside to grab one of the ice pack that he kept in there for emergencies and walked back over to the now-seated Alex.

"Which one hurts more?" he asks as he squats down to her level. She rolls her eyes at his stubbornness.

"Hiro, seriously don't worry about it. I'm fine I swe-"

"Which one hurts more?" he asks, dead serious.

One look at his face tells her that she isn't going to win this one, so she mumbles in defeat, "My stomach I guess."

He nods before motioning towards her stomach, "Do you mind?"

"Well if you're just going to be so darn persistent about it you might as well," she sighed. He chuckles at her remark and gently pushes her to lie down on the couch. She complies and lifts her shirt up to just above her belly button, showing off a nasty blue and purple blotch of skin residing above her hip bone.

Hiro winced but didn't say anything as he placed the ice-pack on top of the discolored skin.

Alex let out a breath she didn't know she was holding at the delightful feeling of icy cold that chased away the burning ache she had previously been trying to ignore.

She looked over at Hiro who glanced at her face to make sure he wasn't causing her any more pain. She smiled gratefully, "Thank you Hiro."

He smiled gently at her words, "Any time Alex."

"You can do your work if you want since I'll be icing this for at least 15 minutes," she said.

"Didn't you come here to hang out though?" he asked.

"I'm fine with just being in the same room as you," she said truthfully, "and it's not like you'll be far away. I can literally touch your desk from here."

He thought it over for a second before agreeing, "Alright, but let me know right away if anything else hurts."

"You act like I'm sick or something. It's just a few bruises you worry-wart," she laughed as she turned on her side to face Hiro's desk with one hand holding the ice-pack to her stomach and the other supporting her head.

Ignoring the comment, Hiro sat himself down on his chair and re-focused his attention to his computer screen.

They sat in a comfortable silence for a good 45 minutes before Hiro finally managed to snap out of work-mode to stretch his limbs. He glanced over to check on Alex only to find her passed out with the ice-pack handing off the side of the couch in her clutched hand.

He smiled at how peaceful she looked. He bent over to remove the ice-pack from her hand before placing the cold limb back on the couch. He then reached over her sleeping figure and grab one of the folded blankets off the head-rest. He unfolded it and gently draped it over her slim frame.

He was about to get back to work when he noticed something. Out of the corner of his eye he saw that the sleeve of her shirt had come off of her shoulder a bit, revealing a light shade of black and blue.

Hiro stared at the bruised skin worriedly as he confirmed that these didn't come from a simple trip down the stairs. If that were true, then why do the ones on her stomach look fresher compared to the ones on her shoulder.

Hiro was suddenly snapped out of his thoughts by a hand reaching out for his arm.

"Hiro?" Alex mumbled in her sleep. He wondered at first if he had woke her up but dismissed that thought when he saw that her eyes were still closed.

"Yeah, it's just me Alex," he said in a comforting manner. He noticed her face relax at the sound of his voice. It seemed strange, but he felt immense satisfaction with the fact that she subconsciously trusted him so much. He never wanted her to think that she couldn't trust him with anything. He would do just about anything for her.

"Don't go Hiro," she whispered. It was so quiet that Hiro almost didn't hear it. But he did. He frowned at her desperate request. Desperation is not something he's heard in her voice before, and it didn't please him one bit.

Hiro reached over and brushed a loose strand of hair out of her face. He leaned closer to her and gently whispered, "I'm not leaving. Don't worry."

She smiled and pulled her legs into her chest to curl into a ball. Hiro's hand slowly moved to cup the side of her face. She started to shift and Hiro began to fear that he had actually woken her up this time, but was relieved when all she did was lean into his touch. A soft smile spread across his face at the gesture.

Deciding that he could use a break from his work for a while, Hiro quietly stood up and lifted Alex's head off of the couch before sitting down in the spot where her head once rested. He carefully placed her head in his lap and began running his hands soothingly through her hair.

Hiro had planned on taking a 5-10 minute break to put Alex's sleeping mind at peace, but ended up following the musicians lead by falling into a deep, peaceful slumber.


	8. Chapter 8

**Hey guys!**

 **It's really late right now and I am EXTREMELY exhausted so this author's note is going to be super short. In fact, this is all I'm saying here. Sorry :( I hope you guys enjoy the chapter though! It's a bit on the shorter side, but whatever. Next chapter's longer, I promise! :)**

 **REVIEWS:**

 _ **Momijifan Low-Ki:**_ I have to say that I always look forward to reading your reviews. They never fail to make me smile! I'm so glad that my story has brought out the inner detective in you. Hey, maybe you'll solve the case before it's revealed!

 _ **Melody Jenna Plumber:**_ ASDFGHJKL. THANK YOU.

 ** _sushiandsouls:_** Fear not! I shall not be stopping here! How could I leave all you lovelies with nothing but a cliffhanger, hm? That would just be terrible of me! I'm happy you're enjoying my work so far and thank you for the complement! I hope you stick around until the end :D

 _ **Rosykiller:**_ Thank you so much! All my hard work pays off in the end when I get to read such sweet reviews from people like you! I hope you continue to enjoy the story and stick around until the end.

 **DISCLAIMER: I do NOT own Big Hero 6 or any of its characters. The only character I own is Alex and if she seems familiar to anybody in real life, it is simply by coincidence.**

* * *

Tadashi made his way towards the garage in search of his goofball of a little brother.

After waking up at 11 to find an empty bed on the other side of the room, Tadashi went downstairs to see if maybe Hiro had already woken up and went to get breakfast without him. Upon his arrival, however, he was informed by Aunt Cass that Hiro had spent his morning in the lab and was most likely still in there if he was looking for him.

He muttered out a quick "thank you" before setting off for the garage to see if Hiro wanted to hang out for the day.

He had to admit that he felt kind of bad for the lack of brotherly-bonding time that he's had with Hiro in the past couple of weeks. He's just been spending so much time with Honey lately and whenever he had free time, Hiro seemed to be busy with one thing or another.

Since Tadashi was free for the day, he decided to take this as his opportunity to see if Hiro wanted to spend some much needed time together.

As he reached the garage however, those thought were tossed out the back window when he stumbled across the two pre-teens cuddled up on the couch that sat against the far side of the garage.

A smile lit up on Tadashi's face when he saw how Alex was curled up next to Hiro with her head in his lap. Upon closer inspection, he noticed one of Hiro's hands tangled in her messy strands of blonde hair, the other lying motionless by his side.

Without giving it much thought, Tadashi reached into his pocket and pulled out his phone to snap a picture of the two. He would definitely be using this for blackmail later on.

He smirked wickedly to himself and slid the phone back into his pocket. Deciding to leave the two be for now, he began to make his way back into the café.

Aunt Cass is going to love this.

* * *

It was around 4'oclock when Alex was woken up from her peaceful nap by the buzzing of her cell phone in her back pocket.

She groaned lightly and reached into her pocket to grab it. Her eyes opened into slits to see who was ruining her well-deserved slumber only to internally sigh at the name that appeared on her screen.

She moved to sit up and answer the call, but was stopped by the light weight on her head that pulled her back down.

Her eyes traveled upwards to see what was keeping her hostage on the couch only to find Hiro passed out with one of his hands buried in her hair.

Alex smiled. She wanted nothing more than to just cuddle up with her head on his lap and go back to sleep, but she knew that if she didn't answer this call then she was going to be in some serious trouble. With that being said, she carefully removed Hiro's hand from her scalp and quietly made her way outside.

"Hello?" she answered the phone only when she was far enough away from the garage to avoid waking the sleeping teen inside.

"Why the hell haven't you been answering my calls?" came a rough voice from the other line. Alex stiffened slightly at the hostility in his tone, but pulled herself together to answer his question.

"S-sorry, I've been busy," she muttered out lamely.

"Busy? Doing what exactly?" he asked accusingly. Alex mentally cursed herself as she tried to come up with an excuse, any excuse, to get him off her back.

"I was, uh, walking around town for the day. Yeah, I wanted some fresh air so…" she trailed off, hoping that he believed what she was saying.

"Really? Because your mother told me differently," he mentioned condescendingly.

Crap.

"W-what did she tell you?" she asked quietly in attempt to keep him calm, knowing that when he gets like this, even the smallest things could set him off.

"Well from what I've gathered, you've been spending a lot of time recently at some café. What was it called again? Lucky Cat Café? Psht, what a dumb name," he sneered.

Alex froze up upon hearing what he just said. He knew exactly where she was right now and that scared her. She was hoping that he wouldn't find out about this place, but she has her mother to blame for ruining that. She just can't keep her big mouth shut…

"Umm, I guess I have. They're food is uh, really good," she stuttered out in a dazed stupor. She can only hope that he doesn't decide to take the initiative to come down and check the place out for himself.

"Hmm, well if you like the damn place so much, maybe I should stop by for a visit," he said. She could practically hear the smirk in his voice.

"No!" she shouted before she could even think. She immediately slapped a hand over her mouth before trying to save herself from her little screw-up. "I mean, I wasn't even staying here for that much longer. I was just going to get a bagel and leave so there's no point. How about I meet up with you somewhere and we can hang out for the evening."

"Nah, I'm curious now. I'll be over in 15 minutes so wait for me," he said. Before he could hang up, Alex tried one last time to change his mind.

"Seriously Akio, let's just go somewhere else. This place isn't all that great anyways so you'd just be wasting your time."

"If it's really not all that great then why have you been spending so much time there?" he asked in annoyance. Alex had nothing to say to that. "You wouldn't happen to be hiding something from me would you?"

Alex mentally sighed in frustration, "No." She felt completely helpless in this situation and knew that no matter how this all played out, somebody was going to get hurt in the end. Whether it be her or Hiro, however, she had no idea.

"Good. Then I'll be there in 15 minutes," he said before the line went dead. She shoved her phone back in her pocket and slid down the wall to the ground with her knees pulled up to her chest. She ran her hands through her hair nervously and just sat there thinking about what was to come.

"Alex?" she heard from the garage. She slowly stood up and dusted herself off as she began to make her way back over to the now awake Hiro.

This was going to be a long night.

* * *

When Hiro woke up, he was confused when he didn't feel the warmth of the petite girl lying next to him. He opened his eyes and noticed that not only was she not on the couch anymore, but she wasn't in the lab at all.

Furrowing his brows at the absence of his best friend, Hiro called out for her.

"Alex?" He got up from the couch to go look for her, but stopped when he heard a shuffling from outside the garage door.

"I'm here! Sorry, just needed some fresh air," she said as she made her way back into the room. Hiro took notice of the slightly stressed look on her face.

"Are you okay?" he asked in concern. She seemed fine before, but now she looks agitated, uncomfortable, and a little scared.

This didn't settle well with Hiro.

He walked over to her and laid a hand on her shoulder. "Your bruises don't hurt still, do they?"

"No, I told you I was fine," she muttered rushedly. Hiro eyed her, curious as to why she was acting so weird. "Sorry, I'm just a bit hungry. I haven't really eaten anything other than that cookie today. Mind if we go grab something from upstairs?"

While Hiro didn't doubt that she was actually hungry, he knew that wasn't the reason for her odd behavior. He would have pushed her for a truthful answer, but the sound of her stomach growling cut him off before he could do so.

"Heh heh, see?" she laughed sheepishly.

"I guess if you're that hungry," Hiro sighed in defeat. Alex smiled at him, but for some reason the smile didn't reach her eyes.

As she was going to walk out of the garage, Hiro reached out and grabbed her arm. She stopped and turned around to look at him in confusion.

"You know you can talk to me about anything right?" Hiro asked in a serious tone. Alex simply rolled her eyes and nodded.

"I know Hiro," she said with a genuine smile on her face. And she really did know. For now she could handle things on her own, but she couldn't help wonder if one day things would get to be too much for her to bear.

While she didn't really have an answer to that at the moment, she did know that if that day ever did come, Hiro would be the first person she'd go to.

After all, who else could she really trust?

"Alright. Let's go then," he pulled her into the café.


	9. Chapter 9

**HAIIII!**

 **Sorry that I'm updating so late in the day. I've been busy all day with homework and a family member's birthday party so it's been a little chaotic for me today. For that reason, I'm going to keep this author's note short like last's weeks. I don't really have anything to say anyways so yeah!**

 **One thing I do want to mention real quick is that I wrote a one-shot for Ouran called Signs of Change. If you guys like Hikaru and Kaoru, go check it out. I won't be making a full story for it because I'm already in the process of writing a full Ouran story for the twins and an OC, but it's still a nice little one-shot with a base for a plot that I feel isn't seen too often.**

 **Any-who, enough self-promotion. On with the chapter!**

 **REVIEWS:**

 _ **Celino:**_ Thank you so much! I'm glad you are liking the story so far. And you are right! I always read tons of super adventurous and heroic fanfictions about Hiro saving the day, but there aren't many stories about him dealing with more realistic, real life problems. That's why I wanted to write this story. Also, I could argue that I left Tadashi alive because if he were dead it would push Hiro to follow the more heroic plot line that was shown in the movie... But really it was just because I love Tadashi so much that I could never write him off as dead XD. He will forever live on in my mind!

 ** _Momijifan Low-Ki:_** You're getting closer and closer to the truth with every review you leave. I hope this chapter answers some of your burning questions. :)

 ** _NobodyKnows2245:_** Thank you!

 ** _sushiandsouls:_** You know what they say. You should always trust your first instinct ;D

 ** _BigXHeroX6:_** Thank you! I'm so glad you like it :D

 _ **FencerKitty: *****_ HAPPY BIRTHDAY!*** I'm sorry this post is coming a bit late, but I still hope you enjoy this chapter none-the-less! Hope you had a great day of thy birth!

 ** _electrogirl88:_** Thank you so much! And I 100% agree. Big Hero 6 is an all around awesome movie!

 **DISCLAIMER : I do NOT own Big Hero 6! Just in case I haven't made that clear in the last eight chapters...**

* * *

"Ahh, sleeping beauty and her prince have finally awakened," Tadashi said wistfully as the two teens entered the café. "Did you two have a nice little nap together?"

Hiro and Alex both blushed at his remark. Alex being the one closest to the older boy, lightly slapped him in the arm with a mini glare.

Hiro just smirked at Alex's action before turning to his Aunt, completely ignoring his older brother, "Hey Aunt Cass, can we please get a couple of sandwiches?"

"Sure honey, just give me a few minutes. We're a little busy this evening," she replied with a bright smile as she moved to clean up one of the tables.

"Oh I see how it is," Tadashi dramatically sighed. "You can ignore me all you want Hiro, but you can't ignore fate. I can see it already. It may just be hanging out at the arcade now, but one day that will escalate into dating and then marria-"

"Would you stop talking?!" Hiro shouted in embarrassment. His cheeks could rival a tomato as he glared daggers at his brother.

Tadashi wanted to see how far he could take this before the blood vessels in Hiro's head exploded, but paused when he noticed that Alex wasn't even paying attention. She was too busy scanning the café with an anxious expression on her face.

Frowning, Tadashi asked, "Looking for somebody?" At the sound of his voice, Alex jumped like a startled cat.

"Whoa, are you okay?" Tadashi asked worriedly. "You seem a bit jumpy."

All thought of embarrassment were pushed aside when Hiro heard Alex's name. He noticed her start to twiddle her thumbs, something that she tends to do when she's nervous. He was about to ask her what was wrong, but was instead interrupted by a loud shout from across the room.

"Alex!" called a rough voice from the front door. Alex froze at the sound of his voice. Oh man did he not sound happy…

Hiro and Tadashi both turned to see who had called the paralyzed girl's name. What they found was a boy about the same age as Hiro and Alex who had brown, slicked back hair, hard black eyes, and was clad in jeans and a black, button up shirt. He looked a bit more mature for his age and seemed to have a 'better than you' type of aura to him.

Hiro already didn't like him.

Alex quickly snapped out of her frozen state and quickly turned around, jumping out of her seat in the process.

"Akio! You actually made it," she greeted with a tight smile. There was a tinge of disappointment in her voice that peaked the Hamada's curiosity. They both gave each other a look.

"Of course I did. I said I would, didn't I?" he replied with a dazzling smile.

Hiro saw Alex shift uncomfortably on her feet, "Yeah, I guess you did."

"So," Akio went on like Alex hadn't spoken, "this is where you've been spending all your time?"

"Uh, I guess you could say that," she said quietly. Akio took a look around the room before making his way over to Alex. She stiffened, causing Hiro to instinctively move slightly more in front of her.

Akio noticed this action. He raised a brow and his eyes tightened into a dangerous glare, "And who is this?"

"Oh! This is my uh- my friend, Hiro," she replied hesitantly. Akio and Hiro glared at each other for a few seconds before Akio broke out into a large smile.

"Ah, so I see my Alex has made some new friends," he said, sending a quick glance over at Tadashi who was watching the whole thing with caution, ready to step in if needed.

Hiro nearly growled at the possessiveness behind Akio's words. His Alex? Who the heck is this guy anyways?

"Yeah," Hiro said flatly, "and who are you again?"

Alex clenched her jaw from behind Hiro. Akio chuckled in amusement.

"Silly me, how could I forget to introduce myself?" he smirked. "I guess I just figured that Alex would have mentioned me before."

Hiro narrowed his eyes at the statement, waiting for this cocky, arrogant bastard to just get on with it already. He didn't know what it was about this guy, but he didn't like him one bit. Maybe it was the way that Alex seemed to want to cower under his glance, or maybe it was the way that he kept eying her like she was a piece of meat. He didn't even listen to what he was saying. All he could think about was how much this guy ticked him off.

His next words however, threw Hiro completely off guard.

"I'm Akio, Alex's boyfriend," he stated smugly.

Hiro's jaw dropped and Tadashi's eyes widened at the statement.

"Boyfriend?" Hiro asked as he turned to look at Alex. "You never told me you had a boyfriend."

Hiro couldn't help the anger that escaped him through those words. Why hadn't she ever told him she had a boyfriend? They were best friends and best friends told each other everything!

He knew that he probably shouldn't be so angry at her over something so trivial, but that didn't seem to stop the pit of rage settling in his stomach.

"I-I, I didn't," she stuttered. She honestly didn't know what to say at this point. She wanted to apologize to Hiro, but couldn't find the words with the look Akio was sending her way. She knew that look, and it was not a good one.

Hiro stepped back from his spot in front of Alex. He took a deep breath to calm himself down. He knew Alex well enough to gather that she wouldn't have kept something like this from him unless there was a good reason. But what reason could she have to keep something like this from him?

Tadashi was catching on to this as well. He took careful note of Alex at the moment, who was staring at Akio with a panicked expression on her face. He knew that something clearly wasn't right here, but he couldn't really explain what that something was. All he knew was that this Akio's "nice guy" façade wasn't fooling him in the slightest.

"Yep," Akio said as he began to advance towards the still shell-shocked Alex. "We've been dating for about two years now."

Hiro couldn't deny how hurt he felt at this statement. Confused at why he felt so betrayed by all of this information, Hiro quickly discovered that it wasn't anger that he was feeling.

He was jealous. Jealous of Akio, jealous that there was somebody who meant more to Alex than he did, and jealous that he would never be anything more than a friend to her because she was already taken.

In that moment, Hiro realized just how much he truly cared for Alex.

He was suddenly snapped out of his thoughts once Akio reached Alex's side. He latched his large hand onto her wrist and yanked her into him, wrapping an arm around her waist to secure her to his side.

"Wow," Hiro said through clenched teeth, "that's great."

Hiro didn't want to look at Alex's face at the moment. He didn't think he could handle seeing her give another guy the looks that he craved so much from her.

When he finally managed to brave a glance in her direction, however, he was surprised when he saw nothing but discomfort and fear spread across her features. She was trying to cover it up with a smile, but he could read her like an open book.

"Yeah," Tadashi added, "you two must be very happy together."

He notices her wince as Akio's grip on her waist tightened, but she quickly brushed it off with a clearly fake smile. Tadashi narrowed his eyes, starting to form an idea as to what was going on. But he decided not to get involved at the moment, hoping to god that this little theory of his was incorrect.

"Of course," Akio replied politely. "Now if you wouldn't mind, we have somewhere to be. Come on Babe."

He roughly dragged her along with him towards the Café's exit. On her way out, she turned to face Hiro and managed to send him her most apologetic look before she pulled out of the room completely.

Hiro stood there for the next couple of seconds trying to process what had just happened.

Tadashi watched as his brother just stood there with a blank look on his face. He knows how much his little brother cares for Alex. With that being said, he could only imagine what his brother was feeling after all that had just happened.

"You okay there Hiro?" Tadashi asked, moving to place a hand on his shoulder. The lack of response from the younger boy brought a frown to his face. "Hiro?"

"Something's wrong."

Tadashi nodded. He looked off in the direction that Alex went in, "I know."


	10. Chapter 10

**Hey guys!**

 **Goodness gracious, it's been such a long week! Luckily, I have testing next week for most of my classes so homework this weekend was minimal and I was finally able to enjoy some free time! WHOOO! Seriously, it's a blessing guys. XD**

 **Anyways, here is chapter 10! This chapter is leaning on the longer side, at about 2800 words, so I hope you guys enjoy yourselves!**

 **Now, I have to make this short because I have some Haikyuu to catch up on before the second season starts ;D**

 **REVIEWS:**

 ** _Momijifan Low-Ki:_** I can't even begin to tell you how hard I laughed at this review! Keep leaving reviews, please! I'm so sorry for emotionally damaging you XD

 ** _FencerKitty:_** Here you go! Hope you enjoy ;)

 _ **BH6FanTadashiIsHere97:**_ You have no idea how happy it makes me to read reviews saying things like "I just couldn't stop reading!" or "You've got me hooked!" It seriously just makes my day to hear those things about something that I've put so much time and effort into creating. I'm so glad you're enjoying the story so far and I hope you continue to enjoy it until the very end. Also, thank you so much for understanding how life can be haha! It gets hectic sometimes, but nothing feels better than getting through something that you thought was impossible to get through at first :)

 **DISCLAIMER: I do not own Big Hero 6 or any of its characters! Just Alex. Not the name... Oh you know what I mean.**

* * *

It's been a week since everything happened with Alex and Akio, and Hiro hasn't heard a single word from her since.

He was laying down on his bed staring up at his ceiling, checking his phone for messages every 10 seconds. He's had to have called her at least 100 times in the past 7 days, but her phone keeps going to voicemail. All anger and jealousy towards the situation has gone out the window. At this point, Hiro was just worried. He couldn't shake the feeling that something bad had happened to her, but he had absolutely no way of confirming this.

He tossed over onto his side for the thousandth time that night, eliciting a loud groan from his roommate.

"Hiro, go to sleep," Tadashi whined from his side of the room. Hiro chuckled at how immature his brother sounded sometimes.

His smile disappeared, "Hey Tadashi?"

"Yeah?" Tadashi mumbled incoherently. Hiro knew that his poor brother was probably half asleep already, but he really needed to talk to somebody at the moment.

"Can I talk to you about something?" he asked seriously. Tadashi heard the unusual tone to his voice and sighed.

Hiro heard his brother's feet hit the floor before the light on his side of the divider flipped on. Shortly after, the door slid open and a half-lidded Tadashi dragged himself over to Hiro's bed.

"I'm all ears."

Hiro sat up before continuing.

"Well, it's just… I haven't talked to Alex since last Sunday and I'm really starting to get worried," he said, his voice heavy with concern.

"Not even a single text?" Tadashi asked.

"Not even a goodnight, and she always makes sure to text me goodnight. I don't know what to do," Hiro said as he ran a hand through his hair uneasily.

"Well," Tadashi started, "have you gone to her house to see if maybe she was sick or something?"

"That's the thing," Hiro admitted in annoyance, "she never gave me her address."

This peaked Tadashi's curiosity.

"That's strange…" he commented.

"I know. She's told me that she has some family issues that she prefers not to talk about so I just leave it be. I'm kind of wishing I didn't now."

"I don't really think there's much you can do then. I don't think you should worry about it too much though, she probably just thinks that you're mad about the whole boyfriend thing," Tadashi said thoughtfully.

Hiro's head tilted, "You really think so?"

"Well you didn't necessarily look all too thrilled when that guy, Akio, showed up at the café last week. It wasn't hard to gather that you were pissed," Tadashi stated with a shrug.

Hiro frowned at the thought of Alex being too scared to talk to him.

"But I wasn't even mad at her. Ugh! I wish I could just talk to her," Hiro moans in irritation. Tadashi wishes that he could help his little brother out, but there wasn't anything he could do.

"Why don't we get some sleep tonight and maybe we can try to look for her tomorrow. She did say that she went to SFFA right?"

Hiro's eyes widened, "Yeah, and they start back tomorrow! That's perfect!"

"Great. Now, would you mind keeping the tossing and turning to a minimum. It may not seem like it, but I need my beauty sleep," Tadashi said. He walked back over to his bed, not even bothering to close the divider door.

"Yes your majesty," Hiro replied sarcastically as the lights went out. He got no reply and assumed that Tadashi had already zonked out.

Finally with a little peace of mind, Hiro laid down and tried to go to sleep. Right as he was about to enter the peaceful realm of dreamland however, the doorbell rang from downstairs.

Tadashi groaned even louder than before. "I just want some sleep. Is that too much to ask for?" he whined irritably.

Ignoring his brother's complaints, Hiro got up and switched on the lights, "Who could that be at 1 A.M.?"

"Maybe it's an ax murderer," Tadashi muttered, still lying in bed. "Why don't you go check?"

"Har har," Hiro dead-panned. "I guess I'll get it anyways since nobody else seems to care."

All he heard in response was his brother's light snoring. Rolling his eyes, Hiro stretched before trudging downstairs.

"Was that the doorbell?" he heard Aunt Cass call from her bedroom in a sleepy voice.

"Yeah. Don't worry, I got it Aunt Cass," Hiro said as he reached the door. He turned the lock and yanked the heavy panel of wood open.

His blood ran cold.

"Alex?" he asked in disbelief.

He almost didn't recognize the girl standing in front of him. She looked so worn out and tired that she couldn't even stand up straight. He stared at her in shock as he began to notice not only the obvious bruising around her left eye, but also her busted lip and the drops of blood staining the front of her shirt. While one of her hands was being used to support herself against the wall of his front stoop, the other was tightly clenched around her midsection as she struggled to take in small, raspy breaths. Her usual jeans were torn at the knee and her thin jacket that she wore all the time was missing, leaving her shivering in the cold with nothing but a thin, black t-shirt to protect her from the harsh, winter weather.

"H-hey Hiro," she managed between breaths.

The crack in her voice seemed to snap Hiro out of his trance.

Without a single word, Hiro stepped out the door and grabbed her arm lightly. Knowing that she probably wasn't clutching her stomach because of a small stomach ache, he made sure to be extremely careful when he reached around her shoulders to support her as they made their way into the house.

"Do you think you can make it up the stairs?" Hiro asked her softly, not wanting any of the panic that he was feeling at the moment to show through in his voice. He couldn't imagine how much pain she was probably in right now. He wanted to comfort her, not stress her out more than she already is.

She tried to speak, but only ended up biting back a pain-filled whimper; settling with a simple shake of the head.

Hiro mentally cursed. Thinking quickly, he turned to go into the small living room instead and helped Alex lower herself onto the couch. With his help, she slowly maneuvered herself to lay across the length of the couch, letting out a large breath she didn't know she had been holding in the process.

"I'm going to need to go get Tadashi and Aunt Cass okay? I'll be right back," Hiro said. He turned to rush up the stairs, but before he had the chance he felt a shaky hand grasp his weakly.

"Don't leave," she whispered. It was so quiet, he could barely hear her.

"It's okay. I'm not leaving," he whispered back. "I just need to go get Tadashi and Aunt Cass to help fix you up okay? I'll be right back, I promise."

She hesitated before nodding. With that, Hiro turned on his heels and booked it up the stairs. He rushed into his room first, wasting no time in shaking Tadashi out of his seemingly peaceful slumber.

"What?" Tadashi groaned in annoyance.

"Tadashi get up. It's an emergency," Hiro said urgently. At the word "emergency", Tadashi turned over and pushed himself onto his elbow, now wide awake.

"What's wrong?" he asked.

"It's Alex," was all Hiro said before he went to go get Aunt Cass. He stopped outside the door and turned back to add, "Grab Baymax and meet me downstairs. It's bad. I need help."

At this point Tadashi was thoroughly confused, but the sudden seriousness in Hiro's voice kicked Tadashi into gear as he quickly got out of bed and ran over to grab Baymax from the corner of his room before making his way downstairs.

Aunt Cass was a light sleeper, so by the time Hiro got to her room she was already standing in the doorway asking what all the fuss was about while rubbing the sleep out of her eyes.

"Alex is downstairs. She's pretty banged up and I need some help. It's not really just scratches we're dealing with here," he said.

"What?!" Aunt Cass shouted in alarm. "What do you mean she's banged up? What happened?"

"I don't know," Hiro replied desperately, "but we can figure that out later. Please just come downstairs."

He didn't even have the chance to finish his sentence before Aunt Cass flew down the staircase. Hiro was going to follow her, but took a moment to stop and breath. He needed to calm himself down. He would be absolutely no help in this situation if he were a panicked mess.

Once he felt that he had himself under control, he raced down to the living room right as Tadashi was exiting their bedroom, Baymax's case clutched firmly in his right hand.

Hiro heard Tadashi's gasp from behind him once they finally made it to the living room. He saw Aunt Cass standing over Alex, who currently had her eyes sealed shut in pain.

Hiro rushed over to her. He dropped down on his knees and grasped Alex's hand gently in his.

"Alex, you're going to need to tell me what hurts," he said. He gave her hand a comforting squeeze, hoping that it would give her something to focus on other than the pain.

"God, what doesn't hurt?" she said through clenched teeth. Hiro sighed and re-phrased his question.

"Okay, what hurts the most?" he asked. Aunt Cass pushed him a little out of the way to start cleaning up Alex's face, but he made sure to keep ahold of her hand.

"M-my shoulder," she said strenuously, "it hurts really badly."

At her words, Aunt Cass rolled up Alex's short sleeves to take a look at her shoulder. One glance however, told her all she needed to know.

"Honey," she started. Her comforting, motherly tone began to shine through as she spoke, "Your shoulder is dislocated. The pain isn't going to go away until we find a way to set it back into place."

"Do you know how to do that?" Hiro asked.

"I do," Tadashi intervened. Hiro stepped aside to make room for Tadashi who placed himself in front of her with a small, reassuring smile on his face.

"Now I'm not going to lie, this is going to hurt a lot. It'll feel better afterwards though okay?" he asked. Seeing the teenage girl before him in so much pain was making him cringe. He might not have known her for long, but she's been around Hiro so much that Tadashi couldn't help but grown a bit fond of her. She was slowly worming her way into the Hamada's little family. She was becoming the little sister Tadashi never had and seeing her in this much pain made him want to beat the shit out of whoever did this to her.

Despite the warning, Alex nodded and bit her shirt as she waited for the pain to come.

She's had her other shoulder dislocated before in a situation similar to this so she knew for a fact that it didn't feel too great having it put back into place.

"Alright on the count of 3," Tadashi said as he situated himself beside her. He moved to place his foot on her ribs as a leverage to fix the joint, but as soon as he put any pressure on her side she let out a pained gasp.

'Crap,' Tadashi thought. He moved his foot higher up on her ribcage. He just hoped she didn't have any broken bones.

"Ready?" he asked her. Hiro squeezed her other hand and she nodded, turning her head to the side to bury it in the couch. "Okay. One… Two… Three!"

The clicking sound of her bone falling into its socket didn't even register to Hiro. Instead, all he could hear was the heart-wrenching cry of pain that escaped from her mouth and echoed throughout the room. At the sound of her distress, Baymax inflated to his full size and waddled his way over to the small group of people huddled around the couch.

"Hello. I am Baymax, your personal healthcare companion. I was activated by your call of distress. How may I assist you?"

"Baymax, I need you to scan Alex for injuries," Tadashi demanded sternly.

With a slight nod of understanding, Baymax went silent for a few seconds, "Scan complete."

"What's wrong with her?" Hiro asked before Tadashi had the chance.

"I can detect bruising along most of the torso and on the left eye along with minor burns to her legs and lower back. There are no signs of any broken or fractured bones, but there is some muscle damage on her right ankle which is also sprained. I've also detected scarred tissue along her left thigh that has re-opened and is beginning to bleed."

As Baymax listed off her injuries, Hiro felt a low growl rise in his chest.

'Who the hell did this to her?!' he thought in pure rage. He's never wanted to hurt someone more than he did in that moment.

'If I ever get my hands on the person that did this…'

"Tadashi, take Hiro into the other room. I have to remove her shirt to see how bad her stomach is," Aunt Cass said as she reached into her first aid kit to grab all the supplied she'll need.

"Okay," Tadashi said. "Come on Hiro."

Hiro nodded, not trusting his own voice at the moment. He reached down and planted a soft kiss on her forehead.

"I'll be in the other room for now okay?" he asked warmly. She tried to give him a smile of approval, but it just ended up looking like a grimace.

With that, Hiro stood up and followed Tadashi out of the room. They both took a seat on the steps by the front door before a heavy silence over-took them.

"Are you okay Hiro? You seem pretty shaken up," Tadashi asked. His brother made no move to look at him from his current position. His elbows rested on his knees and his face was pointing downwards in between his legs. His hands grasped onto the locks of hair on the back of his head.

Tadashi didn't think he was going to get a reply when he heard a faint voice.

"Why?"

Confused at his little brother's statement, Tadashi asked, "What?"

"Why?" Hiro repeated. "Why would somebody do this? Why would somebody hurt such an innocent person? She did nothing wrong."

Tadashi didn't know what to say to that at first. After their parent's death, Tadashi tried his hardest to keep Hiro away from the bad things in life. While he made sure that Hiro understood the reality of things, he tried his best to keep his little brother away from certain aspects that no child deserves to know about, whether it be first-hand or from rumors off the street.

Despite his best efforts, however, Tadashi knew his brother wasn't stupid. Over the years he had learned a few things here and there and probably had a dozen different scenarios playing through his head at the moment as to what had happened to the blonde everyone knew he cared so much about.

"People are strange Hiro. I can't really answer that question, but whatever reasoning that person may have had wasn't right," Tadashi replied. At his statement, Tadashi couldn't help but wonder what exactly happened to Alex before she came here. Did she get mugged or was this the doing of someone she knows?

Tadashi really hoped that it wasn't the latter of the two…

"I hope she's okay," Hiro whispered.

"She'll be alright buddy," Tadashi said reassuringly before he wrapped his arm around his brother's shoulders.

That's where the Hamada brother's spend the next couple of hours; sitting on the steps in complete silence, waiting for Aunt Cass to finish patching up their damaged friend.


	11. Chapter 11

**Hey guys!**

 **I swear, the weeks are going by so quickly! I post one chapter and it only feels like a couple of days before I post the next! It's crazy!**

 **So, this chapter is on the longer side which is nice! It's about 2800 words (without this author's note). I know that I love longer chapters, so I'm sure you guys will enjoy it!**

 **Also, I've been trying to write the Rise of the Guardians story I've been working on, but I haven't had time due to school. -.- We aren't even through the first quarter yet and I'm already completely sick of it. My friend literally cried after a test the other day because it was such a frustrating test!**

 **Anyways, I can't wait to get through this year. Next summer couldn't look any better to me than it does right now XD**

 **Hope you guys enjoy this chapter and thank you so much for sticking around this far. You have no idea what it means to me :)**

 **REVIEWS:**

 _ **XODISNEYFREAKOX:**_ Oh my gosh, thank you! I'm so happy you like my story :D I hope you stick around until the end ;)

 _ **sushiandsouls:**_ Aw shucks, thank you! I'm grateful that you think so highly of my FanFiction :D And I can promise you that I won't be stopping until the very end.

 _ **Revenge of the Red Pen:**_ Wow, I never thought I'd convert a GogoXHiro fan... That fan base is intense man. But I'm so glad you like my story! And I can agree with the Tadashi thing. I love him too much to kill him off in my story!

 ** _Momijifan Low-Ki:_** I'm sorry I made you so uncomfortable with the last chapter... I don't think that it will get like that again though. Wait... actually it may. I hope you are still enjoying the story though! If it makes you feel that bad, however, I can understand if you want to drop it. I hope you don't though :)

 **DISCLAIMER: I do NOT own Big Hero 6 or any of its characters! I only own Alex :)**

* * *

As Alex came to, she began to notice the burning sensation that radiated throughout her entire body.

To say she felt awful would be a complete understatement. The pain from the many bruises that currently decorated her skin was one thing, but on top of that she also felt hot, sweaty, and extremely nauseous.

Alex knew that moving would probably make everything worse, but she wanted to get up and assess the damage to make sure she doesn't have to make another trip to the hospital.

When she opened her eyes, however, she immediately noticed that something was different than last time.

'Where am I?' she thought to herself wearily. She almost started to panic until her vision cleared. With a huge sense of relief, she quickly realized that she was in none other than Hiro's room.

'Why am I-' she asked herself. Then, everything from the night before came rushing back to her, giving her a massive headache to add onto her list of current issues.

"Ugh," she groaned in a low, raspy voice. She winced at how horrible she sounded. She could really go for some water right about now.

She felt the bed shift slightly off to her right, "Alex?"

She didn't even need to look to know whose voice that was. She turned her head in Hiro's direction with a small smile, "The one and only."

Hiro smiled back in relief.

"You're finally awake," he whispered, grasping her hand in a tight grip. He intertwined their fingers before bringing her hand up to rest upon his forehead. With a content sigh, Hiro squeezed her hand and asked, "Are you okay?"

"Honestly, I feel like crap," she stated truthfully.

He chuckled at her response, "Well you don't really look all too great either."

"Gee thanks," she drawled flatly. "You really know how to make a girl feel like a princess."

"You know that's not what I meant. You do sound horrible though. Want some water?" he asked.

She nodded gratefully. She was hoping that he would catch on. He reached over to the stand near his bed and grab a bottle with a straw attached. She tried to reach out and grab it, but Hiro just shook his head and pushed the straw up to her lips.

She let out a huff, but didn't complain as she went on to drink a little more than half the bottle.

"I'm not a baby you know," she said in a much clearer voice. Hiro rolled his eyes at the remark as he placed the bottle back on the night stand.

"I know, I know," he said with his hands raised in defeat. He found that it was probably not best to argue with her right now. He knew more than anyone that Alex hated feeling weak around other people, so being reduced to having somebody giving her water like milk to a frail kitten probably wasn't sitting well with her at the moment.

"Thank you by the way," Alex added quietly.

Hiro's brows furrowed in confusion, "For what?"

"For helping me. I really didn't want to be a burden on you, Tadashi, and Aunt Cass, but I didn't know where else to go," she muttered, refusing to make eye contact with Hiro.

"Hey, you don't ever have to even think about coming to me for help. I'm here for you alright? Through thick and thin," Hiro said smiling right back. His next question came out a bit hesitantly, not sure of how she was going to respond, "Would you mind telling me what happened though? And don't tell me you tripped over your cat again because I'm already calling B.S. on that."

She sighed.

"I'd prefer not to talk about it right now."

"No," Hiro said sternly. "Don't give me that. I've let this whole situation slide for way too long. This is where I draw that line. I know that it might be hard to talk about, but look at yourself!"

Hiro didn't want to force her into telling him anything, but seeing her last night in the state that she was in was so sickening that he wanted to throw up. He never wanted her to be reduced to that again, but he can't do anything to help her if she doesn't tell him what happened.

"I know," Alex whispered. She let out another small sigh. She then looked straight into Hiro's eyes, "Just… promise you won't get mad at me okay?"

The underlying sound of desperation in her voice pulled at Hiro's heart strings.

"I promise," he said whole-heartedly. He even offered her his pinky to show how much he meant it. Alex chuckled at the childish action, but wrapped her pale pinky around his none-the-less.

She took a deep breath to calm her nerves.

Hiro saw her lips move quickly but didn't hear anything other than a small mumbling sound come out of her mouth.

"What? I couldn't hear you," Hiro pressed.

"I said," Alex started, louder so that Hiro could hear her. "It was Akio."

Once her words settled in, Hiro's eyes narrowed into slits, "What?"

"Seriously, how did you not hear me that time? I said-"

"I heard what you said," he said in a low voice. His fists clenched at his sides as he fought off the urge to go find that scum bag and rip him to shreds. "He's the one that did this to you?"

"Well, yeah," she mumbled awkwardly. She then pushed herself up into a sitting position, "but don't worry about it. It never usually gets this bad so it's not a big deal."

Hiro's eyes widened, "This has happened before?"

"Yeah, but like I said, it doesn't usually get this bad. Please, just don't worry about it. I can handle it," she said quickly.

Why is she sticking up for him?! He hurt her, on more than one occasion, and she has the nerve to try and defend that piece of trash!

"You can handle it? Really, because the dozens of bruises all over your body seem to beg to differ," Hiro angrily retorted.

Alex winced at his tone of voice, "I-I'm sorry."

The sight of Alex cowering before him snapped Hiro out of his angry state.

"No, it's not your fault," he said rubbing a hand over his face in exasperation. "I just can't understand why you would think that this is okay."

"Who said I thought it was okay?" she said defensively. "It's not like I want to stay with him. I have to."

"Why though?" Hiro asked, trying to understand her reasoning behind all of this. "Why do you have to stay with him?"

Alex huffed, turning her head to face away from him, "You wouldn't understand."

Hiro reached out and placed two fingers under her chin to guide her gaze back to him, "You're right, I don't understand. I want to though, so please tell me."

Alex felt conflicted. While she wanted to spill every last detail about her annoyingly crappy life to him, she knew that he wouldn't understand. Nobody really did.

She shook her head, breaking from his grip to lean back on the bed tiredly, "If I promise to tell you some other time, would you wait until I'm ready?"

Hiro was quick to object, "Alex, I don't want you around him anymore. If you get hurt agai-"

"I'll do my best to avoid him for now. Just let it go," she pleaded.

Hiro saw the look in her eyes and could tell that he wasn't going to get anything out of her for the time being. While he was upset that she didn't trust him enough with personal matters such as these, he couldn't necessarily be mad at her for it. Maybe it was just hard for her to talk about. Still, he couldn't help but feel slightly hurt at her lack of openness with him towards the subject. He had told her everything there was to know about him, yet she refused to fully open up and do the same.

Seeing the look of dejection on Hiro's face made Alex feel a small pang of guilt in her chest. She wanted to tell him so badly, but the fear of him possibly rejecting her scared her more than words can describe.

She cared for Hiro a lot more than she should and if she lost him too, she doesn't know what she would do. Hiro was the first person in quite some time that seemed to genuinely care about her and she really didn't want to lose that. Ever since her father passed away, she had been secretly craving the attention and admiration that she used to receive. Now that she has somebody who willingly gives her what she desperately wanted, she never wanted to let him go.

Alex was quickly snapped out of her thoughts at the sound of Hiro getting up to leave the room. The dreadful feeling of terror began to race through her and before she could even control herself, her good arm had shot out to stop Hiro from leaving.

Hiro stopped at the feeling of something pulling on his shirt. He turned back around to see Alex reaching out over the bed to grab ahold of him.

"Don't go," was all she said.

That was all it took. Without a single word, Hiro grabbed onto Alex's hand and took a seat on the side of his bed.

He pulled her hand up and placed a gentle kiss along her knuckled before whispering lightly, "Get some sleep."

She simply nodded and was out like a light within seconds.

* * *

It was around seven in the evening when Hiro finally left Alex's sleeping form to go down to the café and get some water for himself.

As he promised, he had stayed by Alex's side as she slept, only leaving to relieve himself when necessary. When he'd come back, however, he found Alex tossing and turning with what he could only assume was a bad dream. When this happened the first time, he tried waking her up but right when he put his hand on her shoulder to shake her awake, she relaxed from her tense state and fell back into a calm slumber.

Due to his inability to leave the room for more than 2 minutes, Hiro had Aunt Cass bring him his meals for the day and he kept himself entertained by working on his project while keeping an eye on the injured girl who was currently curled up on his bed.

After more than 10 hours of being cooped up in his room however, Hiro found himself needing to get out and walk around a little before he went insane.

He took his jacket off and laid it over the small girl, watching her snuggle into it, before going downstairs to get a drink.

He walked into the kitchen of the now closed café and was surprised to see Honey and Tadashi sitting at the front counter having a conversation with each other.

"Hey," he said to get their attention. "What are you guys doing here?"

"Well we were going to go on a date tonight, but decided not to," Honey said. Her face then changed into one of concern, "Tadashi told me about your friend, Alex, by the way. How is she doing?"

"She's still sleeping," Hiro replied with a loud yawn. He hadn't gotten much sleep in the past couple of days and it was quite evidently starting to catch up with him.

"Did you manage to ask her who was responsible for all this?" Tadashi asked.

"Yeah," Hiro said. "I'll give you two guesses."

Tadashi sighed and put his head in his large hand, "It was Akio wasn't it? God, I was hoping I was wrong about that."

"What are you talking about?" Hiro inquired as he grabbed a glass from one of the cabinets before walking over to the sink. He flipped on the button for the filter and began to fill up his glass, listening to what Tadashi had to say in the process.

"I knew something didn't feel right about that guy when I first laid eyes on him. By the looks that Alex was giving him last week, I had my suspicions. I guess I just didn't want to believe it was true," Tadashi said the last part in a whisper.

Hiro's eyes widened slightly before he turned the water off and dropped his cup onto the counter, "Wait, so you knew that Akio might have been doing something to Alex this whole time and you didn't even think to tell me about this?!"

Honey decided to cut in, "Hiro, I'm sure Tadashi just didn't want to worry you. He could have been wrong and then you just would have started to accuse Alex's boyfriend of things he wasn't doing."

"Yeah, but he wasn't wrong!" Hiro exclaimed. "Because of that piece of crap, Alex is barely able to walk!"

Hiro didn't notice what he was doing until he noticed the look of regret that passed through his brother's eyes.

"Sorry Tadashi," Hiro muttered. "I shouldn't have taken my anger out on you. It wasn't your fault. I don't know why I'm blaming you for anything."

"No, you're right. I probably would have done the same if this were Honey we were talking about," Tadashi said grabbing his girlfriend's hand in the process. He gave it a tight squeeze before continuing, "Look Hiro, I know how you must be feeling right now. If I want to rip this guy's head off, then I can only imagine what sick things you're coming up with in that big head of yours for revenge..."

Hiro smirked at his brother's joke but said nothing as Tadashi continued, "But I think we need to call this in and let the police handle it."

"What?" Hiro asked.

"There's nothing that we can do about this and what he's doing isn't right," Tadashi stated firmly. "I'll wait for a little while to let Alex heal up a bit, but right when she's able to walk on that ankle again, we're taking her to the police station."

"What if she doesn't want to go?" Hiro asked. He really didn't want to look like the bad guy by forcing her to file a report against her boyfriend.

"Then that's too bad," Tadashi said.

"Wait a second," Honey added, "what about her parents?"

Tadashi and Hiro froze. They looked to each other with baffled expressions.

Honey stared at them blankly, "Are you meaning to tell me that this poor girl has been here since last night and you guys haven't even bothered to let her parent's know."

It was silent for a few seconds.

"Crap," Tadashi said under his breath. "They must be worried sick."

"But that doesn't make sense," Hiro said in confusion. "I've been with her all day and she hasn't gotten a single phone call. Don't you think her parents would have called her by now to find out where she is?"

Honey shook her head, "You two are unbelievable."

"Hey!" Tadashi snapped. "That's my line!"

"Yeah, yeah. Anyways, I best be going! I have to be up early tomorrow for a meeting," Honey said as she gathered her things.

"I'll walk you," Tadashi quickly said as he got up from his stool to follow her out the front door. "I'll be back soon Hiro!"

"Bye Hiro!" He heard Honey call out as the door closed behind the young couple.

Hiro didn't even answer them. He just stared off into space, thinking about the mystery that is Alex. She was like a corn maze. On the outside, he knew everything about her and could read her like a book. On the inside, however, she was a complex path full of dead ends and winding turns that sent his head spinning.

"Ugh, I am way too tired for this," he said to himself. He then chugged his glass of water before making his way upstairs again.

When he walked into the room, he looked around and let out a groan. He really wanted to sleep, but was too lazy to set up a cot and didn't feel like falling asleep in Tadashi's bed, only to be woken up whenever he arrived home.

Without even thinking about the possible repercussions that may come from his actions, Hiro flicked off the lights and lazily made his way over to his bed. He lifted the sheets with closed eyes and slid into the bed, turning to face the wall in an attempt at making himself comfortable.

Once he found that sweet spot, his mind began to drift.

"Goodnight Alex," he whispered softly before falling into a dreamless sleep.


	12. Chapter 12

**Hey guys!**

 **Let me just start off by saying that I am INCREDIBLY sorry for not updating last week. I really wanted to, but my AP History class and English class slapped me in the face with reality. Basically, I've had a TON of work to do these last couple of weeks so I haven't really had time to do pretty much anything other than read my textbooks and try not to fall asleep or pull my hair out. It's been super stressful and unfortunately, it's going to last until next week but what are you going to do right? It's school.**

 **I'm here now though! I'll try to never skip a week like that again, but with my schedule, you never know. To make up for it, however, I will be posting chapter 13 tomorrow. So there, now you guys have something to look forward to haha!**

 **Anyways, now that that's out of the way, how are you guys? It's been a while hasn't it? XD**

 **Thank you guys for sticking around despite my horrible week skip. I promise I'm not giving up on the story or anything! I was just a bit busy with like 4 different projects lol.**

 **Let's not waste too much time on this review because I know you all are probably dying to read this chapter. I hope you guys enjoy!**

 **REVIEWS:**

 _ **Momijifan Low-Ki:**_ Haha! I'm glad to know that you'll be sticking with this case until the very end. It needs a good detective like you. And this chapter will have a few more leads for you, but no real answers yet. Good luck!

 ** _.739:_** Thank you so much! I'm really happy that you like my story and that I was able to help inspire you to write your own. You truly have no idea how happy it makes me feel to hear that. Also, I checked out your story and it's pretty good! Keep up the good work, focus on you're own writing style, and you're sure to have a hit on your hands!

 ** _FencerKitty:_** I'm so sorry to keep you waiting for so long! I know how long you've been waiting for this chapter, and here it is! I hope you enjoy! :)

 _ **I see you see:**_ Haha! I'm glad I got you pumped to read more. I will say just say this... You aren't too far off on your theories. That's all I'm saying though! I think even that was a bit too much.

 **DISCLAIMER: I do NOT own Big Hero 6! The only person I own is Alex and if she happens to resemble a real person, it is purely by coincidence.**

* * *

As Alex began to wake up from her un-expectantly peaceful sleep, she was pleasantly surprised to find that the pain in both her shoulder and in her ankle had nearly disappeared.

'Huh,' she thought to herself, 'that was a lot quicker than expected.'

She cracked her eyes open to look at the clock that was sitting beside her and found that it was about 6 A.M.

She thought that she should probably get up and head home before her mother gets suspicious. She internally groaned at the thought.

The bed was just so warm and comfortable. She had absolutely no intentions of leaving it.

However, now that she thought about it, the bed did seem a little too warm to her. She thought that maybe Aunt Cass had turned the heat on or something, but as soon as she felt the sheets around her move and a force tighten around her waist, she knew that wasn't the case.

She shifted in her spot, only to find Hiro's body curled around her tiny frame; one arm securely wrapped around her waist in a protective manner and the other bent under his head as a pillow.

She was shocked to say the least. When did he even get in the bed with her?

She felt Hiro move and thought he was going to wake up, but was relieved to see that his eyes were still sealed shut and his breathing still even. As he moved, however, Alex couldn't help but realize how her legs managed to intertwine with his as they slept.

Alex felt her cheeks start to burn at the intimate position she had managed to land herself in. Sure, she's cuddled with Akio a few times, but this was different. While Akio would just grab her and hold her against him in a tight and painful grip. Alex actually felt safe in Hiro's arms. She felt as if nothing could hurt her and she quickly realized how much she liked it.

Though she found herself enjoying their current situation, she didn't know if Hiro would feel the same. He could have just passed out and rolled over in his sleep for all she knew.

With that being said, she began to try and pry Hiro's arms from around her. This task proved to be easier said than done though.

"Come on," Alex whispered to herself as she tried to work Hiro's arm off of her waist. She pulled in all sorts of angles, but none seemed to be working as he still had his iron grip on her.

One thing that Alex learned from this experience was to not underestimate Hiro because he's a lot stronger than he looks.

After about a minute of trying, and miserably failing, to get him to let go, Alex just gave up with a small huff.

'Aw, screw it. I could use some more sleep anyways,' she thought to herself. She accepted defeat and curled back into Hiro's embrace.

Man, this is going to be hella awkward when Hiro woke up.

* * *

Hiro woke up from his much needed rest with a loud yawn.

He debated getting up to start the day, but decided against it as he snuggled into his warm body pillow. He tucked his head into the soft hair in front of him before taking in the familiarly calming scent of lavender.

'Wait a second,' Hiro paused. Pillows don't have hair… or necks… and the last time he checked, they didn't breathe either.

"What the," he mumbled incoherently as his eyes opened.

Once he saw Alex lying beside him however, he found his eyes widening in shock. It took him a few seconds, but he soon remembered how he ended up spooning the petite blonde in the first place.

He felt his cheeks light up at his utter stupidity but none-the-less, made no attempt to move.

Once his rush of embarrassment died down, he couldn't help but notice how perfect Alex fit in his arms. It was like she was his missing puzzle piece.

Wow, he was starting to sound way too corny for his liking.

Craning his neck to look at the clock on the other side of the bed, Hiro saw that it was 9:15 in the morning. He knew that he should probably get up and head downstairs to get breakfast for himself and Alex before she wakes up, but he really didn't feel like moving. He just wanted to squeeze Alex against his chest and go back to sleep.

Whoa, laying it on a little thick there. Calm yourself Hiro…

A soft moan from his side brought his attention to none other than Alex herself. Her eyes slowly opened closing in a harsh manner immediately afterwards.

"Ugh, why is it so bright?" she groaned tiredly.

Hiro chuckled, "Aunt Cass must have opened the blinds."

Alex's head swiveled around at the sound of his voice. Expecting some sort of reaction, or at least a faint blush, Hiro was admittedly shocked when she gave no such thing. Instead, she just stuffed her head back into the pillow to avoid the light streaming into the room through the cracked blinds.

Maybe she was mad at him for sleeping in the bed with her. After all, the position that they woke up in wasn't exactly the most appropriate. With this thought in his head, Hiro began to apologize.

"I'm sorry! I didn't mean to make you mad. I guess I was just really tired last night and fell to sleep on the closest thing to me," he said as he moved to get out of the bed. A hand grasping his wrist, however, to stop him.

"No. You're warm," was all she said. Without even turning around, she yanked him back into the bed with a satisfying thud.

"Wait," said a confused Hiro, "so you're not mad that I basically assaulted you in your sleep?"

It was silent. Hiro had just begun to think that he may have said the wrong thing when Alex suddenly burst out laughing.

"Bahaha!" she cracked up, trying to catch her breath. Hiro didn't know what she found so funny, but ended up smiling anyways at the carefree look on her face.

"H-Hiro," she managed in between giggles, "I don't even think the word assault is in your vocabulary."

Hiro gasped sarcastically, "What? You don't think that I'm capable of assaulting somebody? I'll have you know I once back-handed Tadashi for stealing some of my gummy bears."

After finally managing some control over her fit of giggles, she rolled her eyes and responded, "My bad, you are the worst of the worst Mafia Lord Hiro." She turned to lie on her back, tilting her head to the side to look at him with an amused expression. "Remind me to never get between you and your gummies."

He smiled and pushed himself up to lean on his free hand as the other was still loosely resting across her waist, "Meh, I don't mind sharing with you. As long as you say please."

"Wow! You'd share your gummies with me? I'm honored," she said in a mocking tone.

Hiro nodded his head, "You should be. It's the highest honor that I, Mafia Lord Hiro, can bestow upon you. Just remember: if you ever steal without permission, you lose a hand. Capisce?"

"Capisce," Alex said with a chuckle. "Now that we've got that settled, can we get some breakfast. I'm starving."

"Sure," he said. "You want me to go get you something to eat?"

"Actually, I really want to get out of bed and move around a bit. You think I can go down with you?" she asked with her best puppy-dog eyes. Not being able to possible reject the puppy-dog eyes, Hiro reluctantly agreed. He really wanted her to rest but knew that any arguments at this point would be futile.

"I guess," Hiro gave in. "Can you walk?"

"Yes Hiro, I can walk," she said defiantly. Hiro watched as she pushed the sheets back and sat up. She moved to stand and lasted a grand total of about 5 seconds on her feet before falling flat onto the floor. "Ow…"

Hiro smirked before peaking his head over the side of the bed, "You were saying?"

Alex huffed as a light pink spread across her face, "Oh just shut up and help me."

* * *

"Yes! I swear my ankle doesn't even hurt anymore," Alex said exasperatedly as Hiro helped her into the café.

"Hey, don't get snappy with me. I'm just worried," he said in a tone to match her own. While Alex could admit that she didn't necessarily enjoy people taking pity on her, this situation was different. Nobody has worried this much about her in quite some time. Everybody just thinks that she's strong and can handle everything by herself. Most of the time that's true, but it's also nice to be a bit of a damsel in destress sometimes.

"I know, I know," she said with a wave of the hand. When they reached the front counter, Hiro helped her onto one of the stools.

"So, what do you want to eat?" he asked, making his way around to the other side. Alex thought about it for a second, really contemplating what she wanted to eat.

Suddenly, her eyes brightened as she shouted out, "Eggs and toast!"

Hiro narrowed his eyes in confusion, "That's it?"

"What do you mean that's it?" she asked accusingly.

"Nothing," he said in defense, "It's just that you could have asked for some extravagant breakfast or something, but instead you just ask for the most basic thing you could have thought of."

"Don't judge me! I just like eggs and toast," she said and then stuck her tongue out at him.

Before Hiro could comment on her childish ways, the bells on the front door had signaled the appearance of none other than Tadashi.

"Morning Hiro!" he said in his usual chipper tone. He then noticed Alex awake and sitting at the counter and quickly made his way over to her, "Alex! Does something hurt? What are you doing out of bed so soon?"

Alex chuckled at Tadashi's mother-hen personality showing through. That's something that Alex has seemed to realize about Hiro's older brother in the short time that she's known him. He always puts others needs before his own and has stronger maternal instincts than most mothers these days. Even though she hasn't known him for more than a couple of weeks, Tadashi has a way of making her feel like family. In fact, that goes for the entire Hamada family. Alex knew that if she ever needed help with absolutely anything, the Hamada's would be there for her 100%.

"I'm fine Tadashi," she said, throwing her hands in the air but regretting it once she felt a soreness stretch across her abdomen. She winced slightly but smiled to let him know she was okay, "The soreness doesn't feel too pleasant but I swear I'm fine."

"So your ankle and shoulder don't hurt anymore?" he asked skeptically.

Alex nodded, "Nope! I'm good as new!"

Tadashi let out a sigh of relief, "Good. Now next question, where's your phone?"

"What?" she asked confusedly.

"Hiro's told me that you have yet to speak to your parents so I want to call them and let them know where you are. They must be worried sick," he said, mumbling the last part to himself. Alex's mood suddenly took a nosedive at the thought of her "parents".

"Don't worry about it," was all she said. Tadashi looked at her like she had just told him she had a pet bat hidden in her shirt.

"What do you mean 'don't worry about it'?" he asked in a disbelieving tone.

Alex had to force back a laugh at the face he was pulling. She managed to keep any signs of amusement off of her features as she responded, "I'm planning to go back home today anyways so it's not that big of a deal."

"Wait, what?" Hiro said from the café's kitchen. "When?"

"After breakfast I guess," she said with a shrug.

"I'll be taking you then," Tadashi said in a non-negotiable tone.

"What?" Alex asked. "There's no need for that. I'll be fine on my own."

"No way," the older Hamada replied affirmatively. "There is no way I'm letting an injured, teenage girl walk home by herself on a Saturday afternoon. Plus, I would like to speak with your parents about what happened and suggest having them bring you down to the police station to file a report."

"What?!" Alex exclaimed. She quickly began to panic at the thought of her mom finding out. She wasn't supposed to know any of this. "No! You're not telling anybody anything!"

Both Hiro and Tadashi were slightly taken back by Alex's sudden emotional outburst. Alex saw this and realized what she was doing.

"Sorry, I didn't mean to yell. Seriously though; no telling anybody and I'm not filing a report."

"Look Alex," Tadashi started, "I know you probably don't want to go through this right now, but we can't just sit around and do nothing. I'm not just going to stand here while you get abused by your so called 'boyfriend'."

"He has a point," Hiro added. "If we don't do something now, this could happen again."

"I know," she said getting slightly annoyed. "I don't care though. Hiro, I told you that I would spill everything when I was ready so can you two just please stop bugging me about it?"

Hiro and Tadashi sent each other a look. They knew that if they didn't do something soon then something bad would inevitably happen to her. Now that they're thinking about it though, they really don't know what to do. Hiro didn't want to upset her, but at the same time wanted to do what he could to help her. Tadashi on the other hand didn't care if she hated him for telling people; as long as she was safe from danger. He would have ignored her pleads all together, but somehow he feels that even if he did go have a talk with her parents against her will he would be doing more harm than good.

It seems like they're at a dead end.

"Alright, why don't we just forget about this for now and save the conversation for later? This is your first time being out of bed in 24 hours and I doubt you want to spend it arguing," Tadashi mentioned. He noticed her sigh in relief before turning back to Hiro who was finishing up her eggs in the kitchen.

"Sounds good to me," she said.

"Anyways, on a much brighter note," Tadashi said trying to bring some cheerfulness back into the conversation, "Honey saw some flyers around town advertising a star gazing night at the park and invited everybody to tag along. She figured that it'd be nice to relax a bit after all that's been going on."

"That sounds boring," Hiro complained.

Alex just rolled her eyes at his whining, "Well I think it sounds like a good idea. Plus, I haven't got the chance to meet your other friends, besides Honey Lemon that is. I'm in!"

"Cool, Hiro?" Tadashi asked. Hiro thought about it for a few seconds as he turned off the burners on the stove and slid the now cooked eggs onto a red dish. While going with the nerd squad to look at stars sounded extremely uneventful to him, now that Alex was going he thought that it couldn't be that bad. It would be just like the times they spent at "their spot".

"Alright," he agreed as he slid Alex's plate to her. He disappeared into the back of the room for a second before reappearing with a fork to hand to the waiting girl. She smiled gratefully as she began to eat.

"Awesome, I'll go call Honey and let her know," Tadashi said before exiting the room.

"Mmm," Alex moaned after taking a bite of her meal. "Hiro, where did you learn to cook eggs? They're so good."

Hiro felt a smile pull at the corner of his mouth, but he quickly caught it and turned it into a smirk before replying with a cocky attitude, "What can I say? I'm just that gifted."

Alex stared at him with a straight face. She then placed a piece of egg onto her fork and flung it at his face.

"That was for being a terd."


	13. Chapter 13

**HEY GUYS!**

 **Okay, so I know that I said I'd post chapter 13 last Sunday to make up for skipping a week, but I kid you not, right after I posted that on Saturday, I got sick. Yeah. The world just LOVES conspiring against me. So considering I had a fever and felt like dying, I ended up missing Monday and Tuesday of school and have been making up my school work all week. I'm still not completely caught up on math, but oh well I guess.**

 **So yeah, sorry I didn't post but I swear I had a good excuse! Either way, we're on track again and the quarter is now officially over, so I should be posting regularly. Again, I feel really bad, but what am I going to do right? School is school.**

 **That's pretty much all for today's author's note. I hope you guys enjoy this chapter! Something interesting happens that might give you a bit more info on Alex's home life...**

 **REVIEWS:**

 _ **Momijifan Low-Ki:**_ Hopefully this chapter gives you something to work with!

 **DISCLAIMER: I do not own Big Hero 6 or any of its characters, only Alex.**

* * *

Alex and Hiro had been sitting down talking to each other for a couple of hours now. After breakfast, Hiro decided to take a seat with her considering the café wasn't really busy and Aunt Cass didn't seem to need help. After a couple of hours later, however, and things started to pick up as more and more people came in.

"Hiro, I know you're talking to Alex, but would you mind helping me out for a bit sweetie?" his aunt asked kindly. Hiro knew that she wouldn't be asking him for help unless she was really starting to get overwhelmed, so he didn't argue with her as he stood up from his stool to go get his apron.

"You okay by yourself for a bit?" he asked Alex. "I can help you upstairs if you don't want to sit down here."

"Nah, I'm fine," she replied with a smile, "and I can get upstairs perfectly fine on my own if I get bored."

Hiro rolled his eyes at her stubbornness. Seriously, there's nothing wrong with asking for a bit of help every once in a while. Although he couldn't necessarily complain considering he'd probably feel the same if he were in her situation.

"Okay, okay," he surrendered. "I'll be back then."

Once he disappeared into the kitchen, Alex took a look around the room to spot where the other Hamada's were. It was almost like a game of "Where's Waldo?"

After seeing that the only one on the floor was Aunt Cass and that she was a bit preoccupied to notice anything at the moment, Alex checked her pockets for her phone. She found it stuffed into her right butt pocket on the pants she's been wearing for about 3 days now and smiled to herself. Sneaking another glance at Aunt Cass, Alex made sure she wasn't looking and booked it out the front door.

After making it down the block, Alex finally willed herself to look back and was pleased to see that nobody was following her.

She was too good.

It may seem extremely suspicious that she would just ditch them like that, but she really needed to go home to get ready for tonight and didn't want anybody tagging along with her. She couldn't even begin to imagine how embarrassing the conversation between Tadashi and her mother would have been if he had gone with her as originally planned. She highly doubted her mother would believe or care about anything they try to tell her anyways.

After about thirty minutes of walking, her phone started to ring in her pocket. She reached to grab it, ignoring the looks she was receiving from the bystanders around her.

She couldn't really blame them. Her pants were a little more than worse for wear and while she managed to rake her hair out with her fingers before breakfast, it was still noticeably greasy. The only thing that looked half way decent on her was the over-sized t-shirt that Hiro had let her borrow while they washed hers. Thinking about it now, she seemed to have forgotten it at their house…

Alex looked at the caller ID and hesitantly swiped the answer button.

"Hey Hiro!" she exclaimed with forced enthusiasm.

"Don't you hey Hiro me! Where are you?!" he yelled. She pulled the phone away from her ear to avoid blowing out an ear drum.

"Calm down," she replied nonchalantly. "I'm just going to go home and get freshened up before we go to the thing with your friends tonight. I already told you this."

"Okay, but you could have at least let me know you were leaving. Tadashi and I would have walked you."

"That's why I snuck out," she grumbled. She could picture the look on Hiro's face as she heard a sigh from the other end of the line.

"Just be careful okay? And text me when you get home. Are you going to come back here first or are you going to just meet us at the park?"

"Uh," she trailed off thoughtfully, "I guess I'll just meet you at your place in a few hours and wait with you there. I don't really feel like staying at home right now."

She could feel the questions forming in Hiro's mind as to why she was avoiding her house, but he must have decided to not bring it up because the next thing he said was, "Alright. I'll talk to you in a little while then."

"Okay," she replied as she reached the entrance to her neighborhood. She made it to her doorstep a few minutes later and was not at all surprised to see the door unlocked.

'You're just lucky we live in a safe neighborhood,' she thought to herself as she pushed the door open and stepped into the front room.

"I'm home!" she called out into the seemingly empty house. Unfortunately, she wasn't that lucky. It took less than 10 seconds for her mother to appear from behind the divider in the kitchen with an extremely frustrated and angry look on her face.

"What did you do?!" she yelled. Alex looked at her in confusion, wondering what she meant.

"What are you talking about?"

"Akio called me telling me you got in a fight and now his family is being stingy. This has to be your fault! Whatever you did, call him and fix it now!" her mother shouted at her with a crazed look in her eyes.

"Wait a second," Alex started, "did you seriously blow through all that money already?!"

"That's none of your business. Now go call Akio," she said with a few hand gestures. Alex stood there in shock that she was actually having this conversation. And with her mother none-the-less! Usually in these situations, any normal parent would probably ask something more along the lines of "Where have you been?" or "Who gave you all those bruises?" but no! Instead, she was being yelled at to apologize to the guy that beat the shit out of her! This was absolutely ridiculous.

Completely ignoring her mother's orders, Alex stormed upstairs and slammed her door shut, making sure to lock it so that woman couldn't get in. It was astonishing how much her mother, of all people, could piss her off.

Alex shook the thoughts from her head. She really didn't want to get in trouble with the landlord for punching a hole in the wall and at this rate, that's probably what she'll end up doing. Alex decided that she would just take a shower and get ready quickly so she could leave as soon as possible.

She sent Hiro a quick text letting him know that she made it home alright. She then grabbed a new outfit and went to jump in the shower.

* * *

"What took you so long?" came Hiro's concerned voice from behind the counter.

"Sorry," Alex mumbled into the nearly empty shop, "I took a little longer than expected getting ready."

Hiro gave her a look, but shrugged it off, "Well, I guess I can let you off the hook for now since you aren't late. Honey, Gogo, Wasabi, and Fred should be here any minute now and Tadashi is still upstairs prettying himself up for his "sweet little Honey-bear"."

Alex chuckled at the comment.

"You better watch it knucklehead," Tadashi warned as he entered the room. Alex raised a brow when she saw the dark jeans and not-fancy-yet-not-casual collared shirt that he was wearing. She also took notice that instead of his usual t-shirt and khaki's, Hiro was instead wearing a blue and black flannel along with some nicer looking, full-length jeans.

Alex then looked down at her simple skinny jeans and pineapple shirt with an uncomfortable expression.

"Uh, was this some sort of formal occasion or something that I didn't get the memo for?" she asked sheepishly.

Hiro chuckled, "Nah, this is just the only clean shirt I have at the moment and since it's still a little chilly outside, I figured it would be best not to wear shorts. Tadashi on the other hand is just trying to impress his Love Muffin."

Alex smirked amusedly at Hiro, "Love Muffin?"

"Yup," Hiro nodded. "He tries to deny it, but we all know the truth."

"I'm not denying anything," Tadashi appeared from somewhere behind Hiro, "but one more nickname and I'm going to dangle you off of the roof by your toes."

"I have no idea what you're talking about," Hiro said innocently. Tadashi briefly narrowed his eyes at his younger brother and shook his head at his last statement. Suddenly, the front doors chimed as four other young adults joined them in the café.

"Yo Tadashi, Hiro! How have my main bros been doin?" said a shaggy-haired blonde. Behind him was a tall, Latina woman with blonde hair and large, brown eyes; a broad shouldered dark, skinned man clad in a green shirt and a simple pair of jeans; and a spunky looking Asian with pink stripes blending into her spiked, black hair.

"You literally saw Tadashi yesterday," the spunky one said before popping a bubble with her gum.

"Oh, you know how Fred gets sometimes GoGo," the Latina added with a sweet smile.

"Fred has always been the more… dramatic one of the group," the dark skinned man said.

"I take that as a compliment," Fred replied with a large grin. He then turned to Alex in curiosity, "So you're the girl that everybody has been talking about."

Alex's eyes widened a bit at the statement but she nodded none-the-less, "It's nice to finally meet you all. Hiro and Tadashi talk a lot about you guys."

"Eeep!" Honey squealed in delight, "Hiro! Your girlfriend is so cute!"

Alex and Hiro's faces turned bright red as they fumbled to stutter out, "She/he's not my girl/boyfriend!" Four of the five adults smirked at the teens' embarrassed faces while Fred just carelessly laughed at them.

"Alright!" Honey clapped with enthusiasm. "It's starting to get dark so why don't we head out now?"

Everyone nodded in agreement and filed out of the café with Hiro and Alex in the back, grateful for the sudden distraction.

As they were walking to the subway, Hiro and Alex remained in the back of the group. They listened to the other six's conversations, but otherwise remained quiet throughout the entire walk there.

Everybody was stuck standing in one of the subway cars due to San Fransokyo's annoyingly crammed subways stations. Nobody necessarily had a problem with this, but about half way through the 10 minute ride Hiro noticed that Alex had begun shifting her weight uncomfortably from leg to leg. He was going to ask her what was wrong, but then remembered that she her ankle may not have completely healed up yet and was most likely stiffing up on her.

Without a second thought, Hiro reached out and snaked an arm around Alex's shoulder. Ignoring her questioning gaze, he gently pulled her into his chest and tightened his grip around her to keep her steady as the car randomly jolted.

Alex immediately took the weight off of her bad ankle, using Hiro for support instead.

"Thanks," she said, only loud enough for the boy next to her to hear.

"Any time," was his reply. He then leaned down to whisper in her ear, "You know, if you didn't feel like going anywhere you could have said something."

"Please," she said, "if I spent any more time locked up inside, I would have lost it."

Hiro laughed as they went into a comfortable silence; his arm around her and her head leaning against his shoulder.

'Man,' Hiro thought to himself, 'what I'd do to have her safe in my arms like this every day'. As he looked down at Alex, Hiro realized that there was no possible way of denying it.

He'd keep it a secret for now though.

"When the time is right," he whispered to himself.

"Huh?" Alex asked, craning her neck to look him in the eyes.

"Nothing."


	14. Chapter 14

**Holy guacamole guys... So, I've been gone for a while... Gehe.**

 **I know, you all are probably dying for another chapter at this point. I am so sorry it's been so long. There's just been a lot going on with school right now, both with the work aspect and just my school itself. Some serious shinaynay has been going down at my school lately that, unfortunately, has affected the students along with it so yeah.**

 **Exciting isn't it?**

 **Other than that, I spent all of last week panicking over ANOTHER presentation I had due in English. I swear, me teacher wants to assign us as many presentations as possible until we just all crack and break down in front of our class. I'm sure he would just love that...**

 **Either way, I finished it none-the-less and presented on Friday right after a special lunch I went to with everybody else who received perfect grades. I know, right? Friday the 13th, stuffing my face with food, power-point presentation in English right after. I'm surprised nothing happened, but you know what? I'm not complaining.**

 **SOOOO, now that we are all joined here for another chapter, I would just like to say that I hope you enjoy! This chapter definitely answers a few questions, so I hope that makes up for the small absence on my behalf.**

 **REVIEWS:**

 _ **-Momijifan Low-Ki:**_ I am so sorry for not updating in a couple weeks. I really hope this doesn't throw your investigation off. Although this chapter should definitely give you some leads as well as some answers. However, all is not revealed yet... We shall save that for another chapter.

- _ **sushiandsouls:**_ Thank you so much! And I really hope that Alex and Akio's situation isn't similar to what you're going through right now. But if it is, hang in there. Find your own Hiro and hang onto them. Let them be your rock, whether it be your best friend, sibling, relative, romantic partner, etc. Just don't lose yourself in everything that's happening and you will come out A-Okay! :) And you're 100% correct. I will absolutely not be giving up on this story! I hope you will be sticking around until the end!

 **DISCLAIMER: I do NOT own Big Hero 6 or any of it's characters! I only own my OC's Alex, Akio, Alex's mother, etc. and of they resemble anybody in real life, it is purely coincidental.**

* * *

"Wow, it's pretty packed here," Alex commented.

They had all made it to the park with a big blanket and snacks only to find that there was barely any room left for them to sit down.

"I know. I didn't think so many people would come," Hiro muttered as he glanced around the field.

"Hey! There's a spot open over there near the water!" Honey exclaimed. Everyone turned in the direction she was pointing to see a spot available that was just big enough to fit their group.

"What are we waiting for then? Let's go!" Fred shouted enthusiastically. He then took off in the direction of the unclaimed territory. Honey giggled lightly at his antics while the rest of the group just rolled their eyes.

"Who wants to bet he's going to end up in the lake by the end of the night?" Gogo asked with a pop of her bright pink bubble gum.

"I'd bet against you," Wasabi replied, "but you're probably right."

Gogo smirked at the statement as her and Wasabi walked off after Fred. Honey and Tadashi followed them with their hands interlocked, leaving Hiro and Alex to themselves.

"Fred's quite the overzealous one, isn't he?" Alex asked with a smile.

"Yeah. Always has been, always will be. Come on," Hiro said as he motioned for Alex to follow him.

It was pretty crowded on the field so it took a little bit of stumbling over people and their belongings before the two teens were able to catch up with the rest of the group.

"What are we going to do for two hours anyways?" Hiro asked. Alex walked over to the large blanket laid out on the grass and took a seat. Hiro noticed this and sat himself shoulder to shoulder with her.

Everybody else in the group noticed this and tried their hardest to suppress the smirks that threatened to surface.

"Well," Honey said gently, "in about five minutes, they're going to cut all the lights in the park so that everybody can get a better view of the sky, and then we get to sit back and watch the stars."

"Sounds relaxing," Alex commented. Hiro shrugged, neither agreeing nor disagreeing with her.

Everybody then began to settle down on the blanket. Tadashi sat in one corner with Honey in his lap as they talked quietly to themselves. Fred found a nearby tree that he was attempting to scale to get "the best seat in the house". Wasabi, being the responsible person that he is, was occupied trying to keep the grown man from climbing the tree in the first place while Gogo busied herself with recording the whole thing, trying her hardest not to laugh out loud.

Then there were Hiro and Alex who sat side by side on the opposite corner of the blanket, facing the water instead of everybody else. They sat in a comfortable silence for a while before Hiro decided to break it.

"So, how are you feeling?" he asked in concern. Alex glanced at him and smiled at the worried look he was directing towards her.

"Fine," she replied, "I can barely feel a thing."

Hiro gave her a doubtful look.

"Look," Hiro said in a hushed voice, "I know you don't want to talk about everything that's happening, but you have to let me in eventua-"

"Hiro, seriously it's nothing for you to be concerned about," she cut him off.

"I beg to differ," he said eyeing her busted lip. "I'm not saying that you have to announce your life story to everybody here, but you can at least tell me enough to prevent this from happening again."

Alex thought about this and sighed. Maybe she should just tell him. It's not like she had to tell him everything. As much as she wanted to do that, she really didn't want to lose Hiro. What if he thought poorly of her for her decisions? She can handle disappointment from others quite well, but just the thought of Hiro being disappointed and disgusted of her made her heart clench. Then there was Tadashi. What if he found out about her messed up situation and didn't want Hiro hanging out with her anymore because of it? She wouldn't even be able to blame him for it either. Who would want their little sibling hanging around somebody like her?

"Alright," she said, making her final decision. "It's not really that long of a story, but I still won't bore you to tears with details. Basically, Akio and his family are pretty wealthy. My mom met them about five years ago and has been pretty close with them ever since. Around a year ago however, my family kind of ran into some financial issues and we really needed money. We were just about to lose our house when his family started helping us out. They gave us money every month, but just enough to help us get back on our feet."

"They seem really generous," Hiro commented.

"Yeah well, a few months after they started helping us, my mother and Akio's had a bit of a falling out. They were going to stop funding us with what we needed to live and my mother wouldn't have that."

Alex let out a small sigh before continuing, "My mom always knew that Akio had a small crush on me and honestly, I kind of returned those feelings. Not enough to actually want to be more than friends with him. It was just an innocent crush. My mom however, thought that if I started to date him then his family wouldn't cut us off. It was the perfect solution."

Hiro noticed the distant look in her eyes as she briefly paused.

"I didn't mind that much at first, but then he started to get abusive. I don't really know what happened to him to make him that way. He used to be really sweet and respectful. Either way, I've been with him ever since because we need the money. I don't want to let my mom down. No matter how much she gets on my nerves and pisses me off beyond belief, she's my mother and I'm the last piece of family that she has left."

Hiro suddenly felt angry. It's her mother that's making her stay with him?! What kind of parent would put something like that on their child?! And how the hell doesn't she notice her daughter coming home with cuts and bruises?!

Alex noticed the hard look that began to settle on his face. She felt her insides drop at the atmosphere he was creating and slowly inched away from him before saying, "I know what you're probably thinking right now, but it's not like I'm being a slut or anything! I don't ever let him get that far, I just don't want to end up on the streets."

Hiro's brows furrowed as he looked at her in utter confusion, "What?"

"You probably think I'm some sort of desperate whore that'll do anything for money, but I swear that's not how it is! I just…" she said but stopped half way through, not knowing what else to say. Thinking about it now, maybe that's exactly what she was.

A disgusting whore.

As she was speaking, Hiro's eyes widened to the size of tennis balls. Where was all of this coming from?

After coming out of his shocked state, Hiro noticed how much space Alex had created between them. She was now curled up about a foot away from him with her arms wrapped tightly around her legs and her head buried in her knees.

Hiro frowned at the sudden change of attitude. What had just happened? First they were talking about her situation and next thing he knew, she started throwing daggers at herself.

"Alex," he started. Out of the corner of his eye he saw Tadashi throwing him a questioning look, but ignored it.

He then quickly stood up, grabbing Alex's arm firmly, but gently, and dragged her with him away from the group.

Alex was thrown off when she felt Hiro pull her away from everybody. She tried to struggle, but gave up, not really wanting him to let go.

Finally, they reached a secluded area right near the water. It was then that Hiro dropped her arm and turned around angrily.

"What was all of that?!" he asked rather loudly. He saw Alex flinch at his tone and sighed.

"I'm sorry. I just-" she was suddenly cut off when Hiro practically leapt onto her, knocking both of them onto the ground in the process.

Alex froze when she felt a set of arms wrap themselves tightly around her waist, pulling her on top of Hiro's larger form.

"Don't ever talk about yourself like that again," he whispered into her hair as he tightened his grip around her, pulling her closer to his chest. She felt shocked, not knowing how to respond to that. "You are not a slut or a whore. You are the most beautiful girl I have ever seen. I have no idea where you got that idea from, but get it out of your head. I wasn't angry at you for any reason, I was angry at your mother for letting you get dragged into her mess."

Alex relaxed at his reassuring words. It was amazing how those simple words can erase all of her worries so easily.

"So, you don't think I'm an idiot?" she asked hopefully.

"Of course not. You're doing what you need to do to stay off the streets and I respect that," Hiro said before pulling away slightly to look her in the eyes, "but I'm not letting you do it anymore. You don't deserve to stay with Akio after all he's put you through. You need to talk to your mother about this and if she has any problems with your decision then she can come speak to me, Tadashi, and Aunt Cass about it."

Alex looked up at Hiro in awe. He sounded so sure about this entire situation. If worst comes to worst, she knows for a fact that she can rely on Hiro to be there for her and protect her. She feels so safe around him; which is something she hasn't felt in such a long time that it almost felt surreal to her now.

"I can try to talk to my mom about it, but I'm not too sure how well she'll handle it. If something happens, do you mind if I crash at your place?" she asked, knowing well enough how her mother would react to this.

"Of course. The Hamada house is always open to you," he said sincerely as he pulled her back into his chest.

Alex smiled to herself as she melted into his embrace. They sat there for a good ten minutes in a comfortable silence, just enjoying each other's presence. They were suddenly thrown off guard however when all of the lights in the entire park were cut, leaving them in near complete darkness.

"What the-" Alex muttered as she sat up to see what was happening. Hiro frowned when she pulled herself out of his arms, but also decided to sit up to see what was happening.

He nearly had a heart attack when he heard Alex gasp loudly, drawing his attention back to her.

He quickly looked her up and down to check for any signs of injury or immediate danger, but soon noticed the astonished gaze she had as she stared at the sky.

"Hiro, look at the stars!" she let out in awe.

Not knowing what all the fuss was about, Hiro looked up only to be greeted by one of the most amazing sights he's ever seen.

"Wow," he breathed in disbelief. Who knew the night sky could look like that?

"Isn't it amazing?" Alex asked in wonder. "It's so weird seeing this many stars when all you're used to is the bleak, dark view we get above the city."

Hiro quickly glanced at her when she started talking and found himself having to do a double take. He just couldn't help it with how beautiful she looked sitting there by the water with nothing but the moon and stars illuminating her features.

"Yeah," Hiro whispered as he continued to stare at her, "it is amazing."

"What?" she asked as she turned to look at him. He stared into her bright blue eyes and quickly found himself getting lost in them.

Hiro eventually snapped out of it, turning his head to the side as the color of crimson took over his entire face.

"Nothing," he said, leaning back on the grass to stare up at the stars.

Alex also found herself blushing at the little staring contest they just had. It was strange, but in that moment she suddenly felt the strongest urge to pull his face to hers and kiss him. She's never had that feeling with anyone else before. Does that means she likes Hiro? And if she does, should she act on it? She didn't know if Hiro liked her like that and didn't want to take the chance only to have it ruin their relationship in the end. Hiro was all she had right now. She didn't know what she would do if she lost him.

Shaking her head to rid herself of all the stress her thoughts were creating, Alex decided to push all that aside for now and just enjoy the moment. She had faith that everything would work itself out in the end, so she had no reason to worry over it now.

Alex took Hiro's lead and laid back on the grass right next to him to look up at the sky.

"Hey Hiro?" she whispered.

"Hmm?"

"Thanks," she said peacefully. She didn't expect for Hiro to wrap his arms around her waist like before and pull her back into his chest, but accepted the act of affection none-the-less. She felt safe and secure whenever she was in his arms, and she loved every second of it.

She quickly got comfortable, resting her head on his chest and snuggling into his neck. She felt one of his hands rub soothing circles on her hip as the other remained tightly wrapped around her. She nearly melted from the warmth she felt spread across her body at the simple embrace.

"No problem."


	15. Chapter 15

**And here we go with CHAPTER 15! WOOO!**

 **Wow, it barely feel like it's been a week yet 17ish weeks have already passed since I started uploading this. That's crazy! We don't have much further to go either... I know, it's kind of a depressing thought, but fear not! I will have more stories to come! I think the next one I'll be posting will be Rise of the Guardians, but I'm not 100% sure yet. Maybe like 86% sure. Yeah, that's a good number.**

 **Anyways, Thanksgiving is next week and I have 5 days off! WoooHOOOO! Unfortunately, I have a crap ton of homework and a science fair project to do so... *sigh***

 **Anyways, here is the next chapter! Enjoy :D**

 **REVIEWS:**

 _ **Momijifan Low-Ki:**_ Unfortunately, I didn't write any backstory for Akio. Actually, he isn't really in this story much from this point on. He isn't a main character in my eyes so I didn't feel like elaborating on him. Although, that would make for an interesting extra... And also, I'm glad to know that I have such an impressively skilled detective on this case. It's reassuring to know I've got the best there is.

 _ **xodisneyfreakox:**_ I'm so glad to know I've gotten you addicted! XD Here you go! Here's to feeding your addiction! CHEERS!

 ** _Melody-Ravenwood:_** Thank you! I'm so glad that you mentioned that! It is a writer's goal to hear that their writing has a good flow.

 _ **BigHero6 (Guest):**_ Happy late birthday! I hope this chapter is up to par in awesomeness as the last chapter was :D

 **DISCLAIMER: I do NOT own Big Hero 6! Emphasis on the NOT! I wish I did... but lets be real with ourselves; am I right?**

* * *

It's been two days since the star-gazing event at the park, and Hiro and Alex had become closer than ever. It seems as if whenever they were around each other, they would take every opportunity available to be in any sort of physical contact with each other, whether it be holding hands, touching shoulders, snuggling on the couch, etc. Tadashi had wondered on multiple occasions if they had begun dating, but every time he would ask he'd only end up receiving death glares from a flushed Hiro.

Alex had decided to stay with the Hamada's for a couple more days. She really didn't want to be around her mother at the moment. Of course, she knew she'd have to face her eventually, but she was definitely willing to put that off until later.

She really appreciated Aunt Cass's hospitality throughout this whole ordeal. Not once has Alex felt that she wasn't welcomed in the Hamada home and that meant the world to her. This was the first time since her father passed that she has actually felt at home somewhere and she wasn't about to jeopardize that.

It was 9:30 in the morning and Hiro and Alex were down in his lab; he was working on some project while she was lying on the couch beside his desk thinking up some lyrics for a new song she started working on.

She may have a lot going on right now, but that didn't mean she could slack off with her school work.

"Hey Alex," Hiro said, interrupting her train of thought.

Not like it was going anywhere helpful anyways…

"Yeah?" she asked, tilting her head back to avoid getting up.

Hiro chuckled at her laziness before rolling his chair back so Alex didn't have to strain her neck so much.

"What are you doing?" he asked eyeing her notebook with curiosity. It may seem random, but Hiro was just having one of those days. He couldn't think of a single useful thing to write down, so talking to Alex seemed like the best option at this point.

Alex raised a brow at his lack of focus towards his own project, "Working on my new song for class. What's wrong? Do you have tech block or something?"

"Tech block?" Hiro asked.

"You know," she said while scribbling a few lyrics onto the messy page, "It's like writer's block but for technological geniuses like you."

Hiro smirked at the name, "Technological genius… I like the sound of that. Maybe I should have people start calling me that more often."

His smirk grew at the look she gave him over her notebook, "Calm yourself there big boy. Don't get too cocky or I'll have to pop that inflated ego of yours."

"You're just jealous that you're not a tech genius like I am," he stated playfully with his head held high.

"Yeah," she trailed off with an eye roll, "that's it."

Hiro laughed. He got off his chair and plopped down beside her on the couch. Considered she was sprawled across the entire length of the couch, however, Hiro had to lift her legs up and place them across his lap in order to properly sit down next to her. She didn't protest in the slightest, which pleased the teenage boy immensely.

"So, can I hear what you have so far?" he asked, placing his arms over her legs.

"Huh?" she asked, coming out of her thoughts, "No way! You aren't seeing them until I'm finished. I want to make sure I have everything just right before you're grubby hands get anywhere near it."

Hiro gasped mockingly, "I'm truly hurt my dear Alex. I didn't know you hated me so!"

"Yeah," she said in a dead-panned expression, "I'm sure it's killing you inside."

"Well, since you won't let me see you're most likely amazing song lyrics and I'm going through what you say is "tech block", why don't you take a break for a little bit."

After finishing the note she was writing down, she flipped her book closed and stuck the pencil in the ring before placing her stuff on the floor and bringing her full attention to the boy that she was now practically sitting on, "And what would you like to do on this break?"

"I don't know," he said with a shrug of the shoulders, "just hang out I guess."

Alex rolled her eyes before giggling and snuggling into the couch, "Sounds fine to me."

Hiro smiled at her. She really was the most beautiful person he's ever met. He really wanted to ask her out, but he didn't know when. A lot has been going on lately and it seems as if there's never a right moment. Plus, there were all the "what-ifs" that he had to worry about. Like, what if she didn't like him like that? Or, what if she liked him, but didn't want to get into another relationship after the hell she's been through with Akio? He honestly wouldn't blame her for that last one. There was just so much to take into consideration and all of it was causing Hiro's confidence levels to plummet.

If he does plan on asking her, however, he should plan on doing it soon. He has a bit of an advantage with her staying at his place because he gets to see her every day, not that it really matters since they see each other daily anyways. She isn't staying with him forever though, as much as he wanted her to. If he wants to act, now is the time.

Taking a deep breath, Hiro finally found himself building up the courage to finally let his feelings out.

"So, um, Alex. I kind of have something I need to tell you," he began nervously. He had the strongest urge to avoid eye contact and shy away, but he pushed all that aside and managed to stare directly into her bright, blue orbs.

Alex's brows furrowed together at Hiro's sudden change of attitude, "Yeah? What's up?"

"Well, you see…" he was about to continue when somebody burst into the room cutting him off.

"Really?!" he whined at the intruder. Alex cocked her head to the side questioningly before looking at who had walked in.

Hiro threw every curse he knew at his older brother as he waltzed into the room, completely oblivious of the atmosphere.

However, the look on Tadashi's face silenced him completely.

It was dead serious. And that's not a look Tadashi gives too often

"What's wrong Tadashi?" he asked, sitting up tensely.

"Nothing's necessarily "wrong" per say. It's just- Alex, you're wanted up in the café," he said.

Alex looked at him in confusion, "Me? Why?"

"You're mom's here, and she doesn't seem very happy," he said with a dead serious, and slightly criticizing, look on his face.

Alex looked confused at the criticizing look, but forgot about it completely once his words finally registered in her head.

Her mother. Café. Fuck.

Her features immediately darkened and her hands bawled up into fists.

What the hell is she doing here?!

Hiro jumped when Alex yanked herself from his grip and ran out of the garage.

"What the-?" he mumbled, looking over at his brother for answers. Tadashi just shrugged and the two brothers went after Alex.

As Alex flung the door connecting the café and the stairs open, she was immediately able to spot her mother at a table in the corner of the nearly empty store, chatting angrily with a slightly panicked looking Aunt Cass.

Alex rushed over to them. As soon her mother laid eyes on her, she stood up and gave Alex one of the most deathly glares she could muster.

"Where the hell have you been?! I've been looking everywhere for you, you little brat!" she screamed at Alex in rage. The few customers that were left in the store seemed a bit startled by the situation and decided to take their leave. As they were heading out, Hiro and Tadashi were just walking in; both with equally confused looks on their faces. They had heard the yelling and saw how uncomfortable their Aunt Cass looked towards the situation at hand. At the look of distress on their Aunt's face, they quickly made their way over to her. Tadashi stood slightly in front of her and Hiro took his place at Alex's side.

"Aw, what's wrong? Finally notice you're little money maker was gone?" Alex spit out harshly. Hiro's eyes widened at the amount of hostility in her voice. He has never seen her so angry before, not even with Akio.

"Why you little- How dare you speak to your mother that way! That's it, get your ass over here right now. We're leaving."

Her mother grabbed her wrist tightly and began to drag her towards the front doors. Alex tried pulling her arm out of her grasp, but it was too tight. She was about to lash out when somebody's hand clasped onto her mother's arm.

"Ma'am, I understand that you're angry right now, but I need to ask you to calm down. Why don't you let go of your daughter's arm, sit down, and relax. We can all talk this through," Tadashi's calm, yet stern, voice said as a warning glare drilled directly into Alex's mother's own piercing gaze.

Letting go of Alex's arm, her mother ripped her own arm from the young man's grasp before turning her glares over to him.

"This is none of your damn business! Just because my sorry excuse of a daughter has been whoring it up with you doesn't give you any right to-"

 _SLAP!_

Everybody froze as the sound of skin-against-skin echoed throughout the empty room.

"Don't you dare talk about my kids that way," Aunt Cass nearly growled out. Alex, Tadashi, and Hiro all sat there with dropped jaws at what they had just witnessed.

"And what kind of mother talks about her own child that way? It's ironic, from the couple of weeks that I have known Alex, I have been able to see what a respectable and independent young lady she is. Now that I'm meeting her mother, however, I'm starting to question where exactly she got it from."

Alex's eyes widened at her words. Did she really think that way about her? She always thought that she was being a burden to Aunt Cass, but seeing her stand up for her now threw all of that garbage out the window.

After Aunt Cass's little speech, the room fell into a tense silence. Tadashi was standing on guard next to Alex's mother, just in case she tried anything else, and Hiro stood tall next to Alex, ready to do his best to protect her if worst comes to worst.

Aunt Cass was front of Alex's mom who was just standing there in complete shock. Her eyes softened for a second, but just as everybody began to believe that she was coming to her senses, her face hardened once again as she turned her attention to her daughter.

"You have two hours to get your sorry ass home before I call the police," she demanded before storming out of the café.

After she left, everybody turned to Alex.

"Honey, are you okay?" Aunt Cass asked, placing a hand on the girl's shoulder.

"Yeah," Alex said shakily. "Uh, could I maybe have some tea or something?"

"Of course," she said before heading into the kitchen.

The two Hamada brothers remained alongside Alex as she continued to stare at the space in front of her.

"Why don't we sit down," Tadashi suggested, finally breaking the silence that had previously engulfed the three.

Alex snapped out of her thoughts and nodded. They all made their way to a booth, Tadashi sitting on one side, and Hiro sliding into the other side next to Alex.

As Hiro looked at the girl beside him, he noticed her shaking hands clasping the fabric of her pants. He furrowed his brows in concern before reaching out to hold her cold, clammy hands in his own warm, comforting ones. Alex looked at him when she felt his hand cover hers. She was met by a reassuring smile. She quickly relaxed at his touch and slid scooted closer to him. He responded to this by wrapping his arm around her waist and pulling her into his side.

Alex felt a good portion of her stress disappear. She felt his hand rub soothing circles on her hip, something he made a habit of doing whenever she was stressed or upset. It always calmed her down.

She wasn't scared or anything. She was just wired. She had finally stood up for herself after the years of bull shit she had to take from her mother. She finally felt like she had some control over the situation. But that all disappeared as soon as her mother mentioned calling the police. She didn't in any way want to get the Hamada family involved this deeply with her messed up life. If her mother called the police then there's no doubt that that Hamada's would be dragged into it. Alex didn't want to put that kind of stress on the family that so generously took her in and made her feel like she had people she could rely on.

She hasn't felt like she's had a family since her father passed, but the Hamada's had managed to change that. There was no way she ever wanted to drag them down for it. If push comes to shove, she'd take the fall for them. It's the least she could do.

As Tadashi sat across the booth from the two teens, he couldn't help but notice the interaction between them.

A small smile spread across his face at how close they have gotten over the short period of time that they've known each other. It was true that at first, Aunt Cass and him didn't think that Alex was the best person for Hiro to be hanging around with.

All those thoughts had vanished at this point though.

Alex was the first person Hiro's age that he considered a friend. Sure, he had the "nerd squad", but that was different. The age gap between them and Hiro was just too large. In hindsight, seven years wasn't too bad; but it was enough to leave an effect. Everybody would always feel bad whenever they went to do something that Hiro wasn't allowed to do because he was a minor. And there had been multiple incidences in which Hiro was stuck by himself due to everybody's hectic schedules. Hiro's been bullied for most of his life due to his wits so he's never really had friends his age to hang around with.

That's why Tadashi didn't push it when he finally did make a friend. He may not have approved of Alex at first, but now he can safely say that she has grown on him. That night that she showed up covered in cuts and bruises flipped a switch inside of him. He was, and still is, extremely pissed at Akio for doing that to her. He thought, what if it had been Hiro that came home like this? It ignited this fire in him that has still yet to die out. That, and seeing the way that Hiro cared for her, made up his mind.

She obviously meant a lot to Hiro and Tadashi would be damned if anybody screwed with her like that ever again.

Aunt Cass finally made her way back over to the kids with a cup of lavender tea in her hands.

After raising her sister's children, Cass was able to love the two boys like they were her own and made sure to try her hardest to push them to make the right decisions so that they could have the incredible lives that they deserved.

Seeing how Hiro acted around Alex when she was first introduced to her was a dead give-away that Hiro had feelings for the girl. Cass could see the fear in her nephew's eyes. The fear that he would mess something up, or that something would happen that would turn the young girl away from him.

Seeing them together now, however, guaranteed that Alex wasn't going anywhere and neither was Hiro. Cass already knew what Alex was going to say as soon as she arrived at the table with her tea. She also knew that Hiro wasn't going to have any of it. He would stick with her through thick and thin, just like she raised him to do.

And she couldn't be more proud of him for that.

"Here you go sweetie," she said gently as she placed the cup down in front of Alex.

Alex smiled at her gratefully before taking a sip of the calming, lavender tea. The placed her cup back down on the table.

"Look, I'm really sorry about all of that. I didn't think that she would actually come down here. I really didn't want you guys to see any of that," Alex said, lowering her head in embarrassment.

Hiro frowned at that, "Hey, there's no need for you to be embarrassed. If anything, it's your mother who should be embarrassed. I can't believe she actually had the nerve to say what she said."

Aunt Cass saw the angry look on her nephew's face and decided to give him a few seconds to calm down before speaking, "Is she always that way to you?"

"Kind of," Alex said. "She never called me a whore before though. Look, I should probably go home soon."

"What?" Hiro asked with wide eyes. "There's no way I'm sending you home to that! She looked like she wanted to strangle you earlier!"

Alex felt the ghost of a smile flash across her face before it was replaced with a frown, "As much as I'd love to just stay here, she did threaten to call the cops. I don't want you guys to get dragged that far into this whole mess. I'll be fine. Don't worry about me. She wouldn't go as far as to hurt me. At least in her right state of mind she wouldn't."

"Right state of mind?" Tadashi questioned.

"Nothing," she said quickly, "forget I said that."

She then grabbed her tea and downed it before motioning for Hiro to let her out of the booth. At first, he sat still, refusing to budge. As soon as she gave him a look, however, Hiro gave up with a sigh and scooted out of the booth to let her out.

Aunt Cass and Tadashi stood up after her.

"If anything happens, don't hesitate to call, alright hon?" Cass asked in concern.

"Of course," Alex said. She looked at Hiro, "I'll text you later okay?"

Hiro hesitantly nodded. Before she left, he pulled her into a tight hug.

"Be safe okay? If anything happens call me right away," he whispered into her ear. He felt her nod her head and finally decided that he had to pull away.

"See ya," she waved as she exited the café.


	16. Chapter 16

**HAAAAAAAIIIII!**

 **Yes, I just said yes. Get over it.**

 **So, it's been 2 weeks. *Sigh* I cri every time.**

 **It's got to the point this school year where I'm so stressed, tired, and overworked that I'm starting to slack. That's an extremely bad thing when you're an AP/Honors student... Any who, I still have your chapter for you! I'm sorry this didn't go up last week, I've just been a bit drained lately... My bad :(**

 **Not much to say in this AN to be 100% honest.**

 **WAIT! I do want to mention something that's been slowly killing me lately. NORAGAMI ARAGOTO! Oh my god this season of Noragami is freaking amazeballs! I'm in love and it's killing me to have to wait until Friday to watch. Although, I guess you can say it gives me something to look forward to at the end of the week. But seriously, if you haven't seen Noragami, go watch season 1 read quick (pretty sure it's on Netflix) and then go check out Aragoto because HOLY MOTHER OF HOTPOCKETS it's AMAZING!**

 **Now, back to scheduled programming.**

 **REVIEWS:**

 _ **Momijifan Low-Ki:**_ I 100% agree with you! No woman should ever treat her child this way. It's just wrong.

 ** _.Gallifrey:_** Haha, I can see that you have gotten quite involved with my story. I'm so sorry to have kept you waiting for two weeks.

 **DISCLAIMER: I do not own Big Hero 6!**

* * *

Alex slammed the door after stepping through the front door of her house. She threw her keys on the counter and angrily stomped down the main hallway.

"Mom! Where are you?" She shouted. Hearing no response, she continued down the hallway towards her mother's room.

She tried opening it, but it was locked. Fed up with just about everything at this point, she didn't so much as hesitate to begin banging on the door, "Mom! Open the door!"

After a moment of silence, the door flew open. Standing in its place was a crazed looking blonde woman with heavy bags hanging under wide, dilated eyes. Alex's own eyes widened in shock at the state her mother was in before narrowing into a burning glare.

"Are you fucking kidding me?" she nearly growled. The woman in front of her was taken back by the menace in her daughter's voice, but disregarded it completely.

"Get on the phone and call Akio," she said simply. She turned to go back into her room, not bothering to close the door behind her. Alex stood tense in rage before coming to her senses and chasing after her.

"I'm not calling anybody," she stated firmly. Her mother stopped dead in her tracks. She turned to her, revealing a fearful, nervous, and anxious face.

"What did you say?" she asked. Her eye twitched, making her look even more crazed than she already was.

"I said, I'm not calling him. I'm not talking to him ever again after what he did to me," Alex replied. She used to want to do her best to make her mother happy, but that's not happening anymore. She was done trying to please a woman who cares more about her own selfish addictions than her own daughter.

"Y-you don't understand," her mother stuttered out as she rushed over to Alex and grabbed her by her collar. "I need the money. You need to get it as fast as you can. I don't care if that means selling yourself to Akio. You will do it for your mother. Do you understand?"

Alex's eyes widened.

It was quiet.

"You did not just say what I think you just said," Alex muttered, a look of hurt and betrayal carved into her features.

"Oh please," she snarled, "You two have known each other forever. It's not like he's gonna be banging some random slut."

Alex's jaw dropped wide open.

"Oh my god," she whispered in bewilderment. Was she really hearing this correctly? Was her mother, the woman who gave birth to her and raised her seriously telling her to go have sex with the guy that had been hurting her so horribly just to get some extra cash?

Alex felt her heart shatter at the thought.

"Hurry up, you don't have much time," her mother, scratch that, Marlene said in a panicked tone.

Alex snapped out of her daze, "What do you mean we don't have much time?"

Marlene's silence only raised Alex's suspicions.

"Answer me!" Alex shouted, tearing herself from Marlene's grip.

"They're looking for me okay!?" she finally shouted. "I haven't been able to pay them yet and they're not happy about it. Please, won't take that long for them to find me! You need to get the money!"

Alex couldn't believe what she was hearing. When exactly did her kind, loving mother turn into this cold, selfish, drug addict who didn't give a shit about her own flesh and blood and would willingly put her and her daughter in danger for a few lines of cocaine?

Tears burned Alex's eyes. She used to feel nothing but love for her mother, but that had changed juristically. She no longer looks up to her mother with admiration and affection. No, all of that has been replaced with disappointment and humiliation. She wanted to help her mother, she really did, but this has gotten out of hand. Somebody was going to get seriously hurt if this continued. She knew her mother wasn't capable of making rational decisions at the moment, so Alex decided that she was going to have to be the one to make those decisions for her, as much as it hurt her to do so.

"Mom," Alex said slowly and somewhat desperately as she raised her head to meet Marlene's gaze, "why don't we just call the police and get all of this worked out. They can protect us and get you some help."

This was the wrong thing to say as Marlene began to furiously lash out.

"No! No, they'll ruin everything! I don't need help! How dare you call me crazy! This is all your fault. You made him eave! If it weren't for you, he's still be alive and I wouldn't have to deal with an ungrateful piece of shit for a daughter!"

Alex froze.

"Why don't you just get the fuck out of this house?! I don't need you! All you do is fuck everything up! Just get out!" She screamed, falling to the floor with her head in between her hands. Violent sobs began to echo throughout the room, but Alex didn't register any of it.

She was still trying to process what her mother said to.

A minute or so passes. Alex slowly began backing out of the room. She stumbled into the door and fell on her back side. Tears streamed down her face as she stood abruptly. She didn't even look back when she took off down the hallway and out the front door.

She had no idea where to go, but none of that mattered anyways. She didn't make it past her neighbor's house before she collapsed onto the cold concrete beneath her. It was dark outside, so unless somebody walked directly passed her, they would have never notice her sitting there alone.

Broken and alone.

Why did this have to happen? What had went so horribly wrong that her mother had to resort to all of this? Sure, her husband passed away, but she wasn't the only person that lost somebody important to them. Alex lost her father as well. Why couldn't Marlene see that? Why couldn't she understand that she wasn't alone? She had somebody who understood exactly how she felt, but she just seemed to write that off like it didn't matter.

'Maybe it was my fault,' Alex thought to herself. 'Maybe if I tried to be there for her more when he died instead of crying like the useless little-'

'No!' she cut herself off. She wasn't useless. That woman was wrong. If anybody was to blame for all of this, it was her. She was the one to let herself slip away while Alex stood strong and moved on. She would not let what that woman said get to her.

The sound of an engine from behind her brought Alex back to reality. She turned around to see what the noise was. That was when she saw the small black car pull up in front of her house.

She was confused, but didn't bother to move. She couldn't move. Instead, she sat and watched to see who it was that was going to get out of the vehicle.

Soon, the driver's door opened and out stepped a tall, bulky, and muscular man who looked to be from Mexican decent. Alex could see a smirk on his face as he reached back into the car to grab something that Alex couldn't quite make out.

She focused her eyes and tried to see what he had in his hands as he began to make his way to the front door.

Alex still didn't make any sort of movement. As much as her mind was telling her that something wasn't right with this situation and that she needed to do something quickly before something bad happened, her body just wasn't responding.

When he reached the door, he didn't bother knocking like Alex had expected. To her horror, he chose a more convenient route and simple kicked the door down.

That was when everything seemed to connect.

What the man had in his hand was a gun and he was here for the money.

The money.

No…

Alex stared wide eyed at her own home.

A loud scream made Alex jump. A wave of pure terror spiked throughout her entire body. The tears were flowing down her face like water down a raging river as she reached into her pocket with a shaky hand to grab her cell phone.

She dialed 911, pushing down the urge to vomit as she awaited an answer.

"Hello, 911 what's your emergency?" said a monotonous voice.

"P-p-please, help. My m-mother is- she's g-going to be- they're going t-to kill her," Alex managed through short, panicked breaths.

"Ma'am," the voice said in a more serious tone, "Who's going to kill her?"

"H-her," she started, but stopped short. Was she really going to rat her mother out just like that? There's no doubt that she would be arrested as well as soon as the police arrived if she told the truth. This was serious though. Alex would take her mother being in jail over being dead any day.

"Her drug dealer," she said firmly. She took in a deep breath in an attempt to collect herself and continued to speak in a more assertive tone, "A man just walked into our house with a gun, so please hurry. His license plate is 6HG-890. The address is-"

 _BANG!_

Alex stopped short.

It didn't take much time for her brain to register what the noise had been, but she couldn't bring herself to believe that it was what she thought it was.

"No," she gasped. She stared intently at the front door, hoping that it was her mother who walked out and not the man from earlier.

"Ma'am," the voice said in a rushed voice, "ma'am, help is on the way. Please stay whe-"

Alex didn't get to hear the rest. Her phone dropped out of her hands and clattered to the ground.

When the man walked out of the house, Alex couldn't really say she felt surprised. Deep in her mind, she knew exactly what happened.

She wasn't stupid, just hopeful.

That hope was dead now.

She didn't pay any mind to the car that had already driven away. All her brain could focus on at this point was the sound of a gunshot and the visuals that went along with it.

Slowly, Alex made her way onto her shaky feet and started walking over to her house..

She reached her porch after a few minutes of dazed wandering. She dragged herself up the steps and past the spot where the front door used to be.

She didn't even cast a glance at the broken door lying on the ground as she side-stepped it. She continued on past the coffee table that's been in her family for generations, past the line of family photos on the hallway wall, past her bedroom…

In her mother's bedroom was where she found her.

Lying in the corner of the room was a lifeless body surrounded in blood, a single bullet hole to the head. Glassy eyes stared back at Alex with a gaze that ripped its way through her heart and soul.

It was then that reality began to sink in.

"No!" she screamed. And she didn't stop there. She continued to scream and scream and scream. She screamed and wailed until she didn't have the voice left to do so.

And then she cried.

She fell into the pool of blood surrounding her mother, the only family she had left. She grabbed her body and pulled it close to her as she continued to weep in sorrow.

It felt like hours before she heard the distinct sound of police sirens pull up to the house. She didn't even acknowledge them when they came into the room with guns poised and ready to disarm any intruders. All she could focus on was the corpse of the woman who gave birth to her, who raised her…

And who was now lying dead in her arms.

After that, everything seemed to fade into haziness.

Alex couldn't really remember what happened after that. All she could remember was the color red.


	17. Chapter 17

**Hey everybody!**

 **Let me just start this off by saying, HOLY COW and I exhausted right now. I just got finished working at this Christmas festival thing that we have every year where I live and let me just say, I am so sick of hot chocolate, looking at it would make me nauseous at this point. I guess it was fine until the rushed came. There was one point where we were backed up with only one machine working and then somebody ordered 13 hot chocolates. 13! They literally spent $20 in hot chocolate. What a waste. And of course, that just made the whole backed up situation 1000 times worse. We managed to get through though. And I'm not going to lie, it was kind of fun. Even if it was 6 hours of constant hot chocolate making...**

 **So anyways, here is the next chapter! I know I didn't post last week, and I'm sorry for that. I just had a lot of projects and other school stuff to do considering last week was my last week before break. And by the way...**

 **IT'S WINTER BREAK! WOOOOOO!**

 **I'm so happy, I could cry. Literally, the thing I'm looking forward to the most this break is being able to sleep. I am so sleep deprived from the first semester that I could probably hibernate all throughout winter if I wanted to. Unfortunately, I still have some homework to do so that won't work, but it's still a good idea in my mind. Another bad thing is that we have mid-terms when we get back, so whoopee. I'll worry about that when the time comes though. For now, I'll just enjoy my break while it lasts.**

 **So yeah, that's everything that's been going on recently. Thank you guys for reading if you read this whole author's note. It's perfectly fine if you just skipped right to the story, but I really appreciate it if you stuck through this until the end. It makes me feel so happy :3**

 **REVIEWS:**

 ** _Melody-Ravenwood:_** I know. To be quite honest, I wasn't either when I was writing it. I surprised myself haha!

 ** _Momijifan Low-Ki:_** Did I break you? I hope I didn't break you. We still have a few more chapters left!

Yeah, it was unexpected for me as well when I was writing it. But hey, that's what being a writer is I guess. Shocking yourself as well as everybody else around you XD

 _ **BLUENIGHT23:**_ Thank you so much! I'm so happy you enjoy it :D

 ** _(Guest) A Man-Person:_** Don't worry, I will most definitely be finishing this story. In fact, it's already written, I just need to post it. It should be completed sometime in the beginning of January. Thank you so much for reading! I'm glad you like it :D

 _ **Yin14:**_ PORQUE! PORQUE! There's my super crazy response to your super crazy reaction. And thank you so much! I appreciate that you're following my story and love it so much. Also, I'm sorry if the chapters get postponed some weeks. It's just that I am really busy with school right now, so sometimes I don't get to post as often as I'd like. But I am happy that you still follow my story! Thank you so much :)

 **DISCLAIMER: I do NOT own Big Hero 6 or any of its characters! I only own my OC.**

* * *

Hiro was attempting to do his homework, but found himself unable to focus on anything other than Alex. He hasn't gotten a call or text from her yet and was worried beyond belief. There was no way he was going to be able to focus on anything, especially homework, until he was sure that she was okay.

Hiro heard footsteps enter the room and didn't even need to look up to know that it was Tadashi.

"Did you get anything from her yet?" he asked, taking a seat at the base of Hiro's bed.

Hiro sighed, "No, she hasn't called yet. What am I supposed to do Tadashi? I want to help her, but I have no clue what I'm supposed to do."

Hiro sat next to Tadashi on the bed. His elbows fell on his knees as he tugged at his messy black locks in frustration.

Tadashi sighed. "Well, there's not much I can say here. I guess all that you can do right now is be there for her. She's going through a lot and doesn't seem like she has anybody she can really trust. In my opinion, what she needs the most right now is somebody that she can truly rely on."

Hiro groaned, "I feel so useless though! All I'm doing is sitting here trying to make her feel better every time something bad happens, but why does it have to be that way? Why can't I prevent those bad things from happening in the first place so she doesn't have to be so upset? I just want her to be happy."

Tadashi saw the look of anguish on his little brother's face and was able to sympathize with him. Not being able to fix your loved ones problems is the worst thing in the world, but what's there to be done about it? Nothing.

"Look Hiro," Tadashi said, "comforting somebody when their down isn't a useless thing to do. I know you might want to take care of all of her issues for her, but in the end, that wouldn't really benefit anybody. This is her problem and she needs to deal with it on her own. The best thing we can do is be there for her when she needs us and gently guide her to do the things she needs to do. You can't fight other people's battles for them."

Hiro thought over his brother's words and came to the realization that he was right. Alex was clearly dealing with stuff that traces way back to before he ever even knew her. What right does he have to ignorantly storm into the situation and try to defend her while he knows absolutely nothing about what's really going on.

Hiro rubbed a hand tiredly down his face, "I guess you're right."

"If things get out of hand though, you may need to step in. That's the only exception. Like I said before, Alex doesn't have anybody she can trust. She doesn't have anybody to look out for her. I know you care about her Hiro, so you're going to have to be the person that she can go to if things get too rough for her to deal with on her own. And if it get really bad, Aunt Cass and I will be there to back you guys up."

After his monologue, Hiro and Tadashi sat in silence for a few minutes. Hiro took the time to let all of his brother's words of advice sink in.

"You're right," Hiro said after a moment of silence. "Thanks Tadashi."

"No problem knucklehead," he said with a soft smile. "Now come on, Aunt Cass has dinner waiting for us downstairs."

"Alright," Hiro said. Before they were even on their feet, Aunt Cass's voice called them from downstairs.

"Boys! Come down here quickly!" she shouted in a rushed and worried voice. Hiro and Tadashi looked at each other in confusion. They hurriedly made their way down the stairs and into the kitchen.

"What's up Aunt Cass?" Hiro asked.

Tadashi was quick to notice the underlying look of panic in her eyes which only made him feel more uneasy. He was only gone for five minutes, what could have happened in that short time frame?

"It's Alex," she said. At those two simple words, Hiro paled and Tadashi tensed in concern.

"W-what happened?" Hiro asked hesitantly. If Aunt Cass was called instead of him, then that meant that whatever it was has to be serious.

"I don't know exactly, but the police station called and said that Alex was there. They asked her who to call and she said us, but they wouldn't tell me anything else. Go get your shoes on, both of you."

The two Hamada's didn't need to be told twice as they rushed up the stairs to grab their stuff.

It took them less than a minute to be ready and out the door.

* * *

Before the car could come to a complete stop, Hiro was out the door and running towards the entrance of the police station.

He didn't bother waiting for Tadashi or Aunt Cass. All that mattered to him at the moment was making sure that nothing had happened to Alex and that she was safe.

Hiro paid no mind to the strange looks he was getting as he rushed through the sliding doors that led to the lobby of the station. All he could seem to think about were all the possible scenarios of what could have happened to land Alex here of all places.

Hiro shook those thoughts out of his head when he reached the front counter.

"Hello, what can I do for you?" asked a small, stocky man with an accent.

"I'm here for Alex," Hiro managed in between small gasps of breath.

The man gave Hiro a suspicious look before replying, "I'm pretty sure I spoke with a Cassidy Hamada. No offence kid, but you don't look like a Cassidy."

Hiro nearly growled in response, "She's my aunt. She's right behind me, so could you please just show me to Alex?"

The man continued to stare at Hiro with a poker face. Hiro was just about to leap at the man when Aunt Cass finally caught up with him.

"I'm Cassidy Hamada sir, and he is with me. He's my nephew," she explained. Hiro looked back and saw Aunt Cass and Tadashi coming in behind him. He turned back to the officer and nodded at what she said.

The officer looked at the three and let out a small sigh before standing up, "Well, follow me then."

Hiro waited anxiously for the man to unlock the door. As soon as he did, they all followed the man past the front desk and into a large room with various desks and cubicles set up inside.

"May I ask what exactly happened to Alex sir?" Tadashi asked with a worried frown.

The officer sighed again, but this one sounded more like a sigh of pity than anything else.

"I guess. I mean, she did have me call you for a reason," he said. "We got some phone calls a couple of hours ago saying that they heard gun shots from one of the houses on the block as well as a call from a distressed teen saying that somebody was going to kill their mother. When we got there however, the poor girl was sitting in a pool of blood with, what records confirmed was, her mother in her arms."

Hiro's heart stopped.

Alex's mom was dead? And she witnessed it? How did that even happen?

Aunt Cass and Tadashi's eyes widened immensely at the information. Aunt Cass's eyes started to water for the girl while Tadashi remained stoic throughout the whole thing. He was angry at that fact that this poor girl has been through so much. She doesn't deserve any of this.

The group grew quiet as they made their way towards one of the back offices. As they neared, they saw a large window on one of the walls and inside sat a pale, trembling Alex. There was a female officer standing next to her. She was trying to talk to her but it didn't look like Alex was even aware of her existence. She just continued to stare forwards with a blank expression on her exhausted looking features.

"Can I go in?" Hiro asked without tearing his eyes away from the window. The officer just shrugged and gestured for them to follow him. He then opened the door slowly and quietly as to avoid startling the already traumatized girl.

Alex didn't even look up when the door opened. The female officer looked at who was as the door before sighing and walking over to them.

"She's not responding at all," she whispered to the male officer. He nodded and pointed to the group of three behind him. She looked back at them and began talking to Aunt Cass, but Hiro didn't pay attention to that. All he could focus on was the girl sitting on the other side of the room facing away from him.

His heart ached at how fragile and weak Alex looked. He didn't care how horrible her mother was, she was still her mother and he knew more than anyone that losing a parent was not an easy thing. At least when his parents died, he and Tadashi were able to stay with their aunt. From what Hiro had gathered over the time he's spent with Alex, she doesn't have anybody else. Her mother was the only family she had left.

Tadashi's words suddenly popped into his head.

 _You're going to have to be the person she can go to when things get rough._

Hiro quickly calmed himself down, collecting himself before he slowly made his way over to her.

When he reached her, he saw that her head was down and her shaking hands were clenched into fists. His frown deepened, and he continued to squat down to meet her at eye level.

"Alex?" he asked softly. Her body stiffen at his voice. After a few seconds of silence, she lifted her eyes to meet his gaze.

The amount of sadness and pain behind her dull blue eyes sent shivers up Hiro's spine. He felt tears start to burn his eyes, but pushed them back for Alex's sake. He needed to stay strong for her.

"H-Hiro?" she whispered in a voice heavy with emotion.

"Yeah, it's me," was all he said.

Alex looked at him with wide, scared eyes. Hiro began to think that maybe she was in shock, but was proven wrong when tears started to pour down her face.

"Sh-she's gone," she hiccupped, continuing to stare Hiro in the eyes. "I couldn't help her, and now she's gone."

"No, don't say that. It's not your fault," he reassured in a soft voice. Suddenly, Alex jumped up out of her chair and right onto Hiro's chest, knock him back a bit before he was able to catch himself.

He was thrown off by her sudden actions, but relaxed as soon as he felt her arms wrap themselves tightly around his neck.

"She's gone! Why'd she have to die too?! Why'd she have to leave me alone?!" she sobbed into Hiro's shirt. Out of the corner of his eye, Hiro saw everybody step out of the room to give them some privacy.

"Shh, I know," he whispered, wrapping his arms around her waist and holding her tightly. "It's okay. Let it out."

"Why did she have to get involved in this?! I was there for her! I could have helped her! Did she really hate me that much?!"

Hiro sat there in complete silence, just holding her and letting her vent. He knew that she needed to get all of this of her chest and wanted to allow her to do so.

After a few minutes of yelling out all of her frustrations, Alex managed to calm herself down enough to stop crying. Even so, Hiro still didn't let her go.

"Hiro?" she asked quietly.

"Hmm?"

"I'm tired."

"I know," Hiro said, understanding the double meaning behind her words, "but hey, look at me."

Alex pulled back from his chest just enough to be able to look into his eyes.

"You'll always have me okay? No matter what happens, I'm there for you. You can count on it," he stated with confidence.

Alex relaxed at his statement, but she didn't smile. Hiro figured it'd be a while until he could see that beautiful smile again.

"Thank you," she murmured as she buried her head into the crook of his neck.

Hiro's eyes softened at her words. A small smile carved its way onto his face. He rested his chin on top of her head and didn't say anything else. He just tightened his grip on her, letting her know that he would always be there and that he wasn't going anywhere.


	18. Chapter 18

**You guys probable want to kill me don't you? Yeah, I don't blame you. I have been SO incredibly lazy lately with the things that I need to get done, it's astounding.**

 **SORRY FOR NOT UPDATING! I know, its been a couple weeks. Like I said, I didn't do anything over break. I got sick and then the laziness kicked in for the second half of the break so yeah... BUT HERE I AM! And guess what...**

 **There's only two more chapters left!**

 **I know! Crazy! It feels like just yesterday that I was posting the first chapter for this story, excited to see what people would think and now here we are: almost at the end. But it's not the end of course. I will definitely be writing more stories in the future! I already have a few stories in the works and I've also been SERIOUSLY addicted to Avengers and Captain America lately and have some one-shot goodness coming up with that very soon if your interested. Seriously though, I've always loved Avengers and Captain America (especially Bucky :3), so I have no idea why I have deprived myself of reading FanFiction for them for this long.**

 **Anyways, here's chapter 18! I hope you guys enjoy. It's kind of short, but I am starting to wrap things up so a chapter like this was to be expected.**

 **REVIEWS:**

 _ **Yin14:**_ I'm so happy that I've been able to strike such emotion within you! That's definitely one of the many goals of a writer. And I'm glad you like the story! I'll keep up until the very end. Don't worry :D

 _ **Momijifan Low-Ki:**_ Dang... I'm sorry? I didn't think something like that would happen from reading my story. Well, at least the worst is over! Nothing more traumatic happens from here on out, so I hope you can enjoy the rest of it in peace. :)

 **DISCLAIMER: I do NOT own Big Hero 6 or any of its characters!**

* * *

It's been a few days since the incident at the police station and quite a bit has happened since then.

It was decided that Alex would stay with the Hamada's until the court could find a suitable home for her. They were looking through records to see if they could find and contact any family she may have, but so far they've come up with nothing. They already told Aunt Cass that if they couldn't find a relative for her to stay with, then she would have to be put into the foster care system until she's 18 and able to live on her own.

This did not settle well at all with any of the Hamada's. They've heard many horror stories related to foster homes and did not feel even remotely comfortable putting Alex into one of them.

Hiro has had a serious discussion with his aunt after the topic of foster homes came up and has managed to convince her to go for custody over the young girl. He knew that he was asking a lot of his aunt, but there was really no other choice.

Fortunately, Aunt Cass understood this and agreed 100%. She had the financial means to support another person, considering how much business she got at Lucky Cat, so she didn't see any problem with bringing another child under her roof. Especially since it's somebody that she and her two nephews care so much about.

The only thing they had to worry about at that point was whether the court would approve or deny all of this. The social worker appointed to their case said that it would take a couple of days to process through the system, but until then, Alex was granted permission to stay in their home.

An officer had showed up the morning after the whole station incident to ask Alex some questions and look around to make sure that she was in a safe living environment. Hiro had initially thought that it was way too soon for Alex to have to go through re-living everything, and was more than willing to defend her, but was surprised when she held back her tears and answered all of his questions willingly and to the best of her knowledge.

She asked him to sit with her for comfort as she recalled everything she knew about her mother's death.

She spoke about how her mother developed a drug problem after her father died and had used her as a means to gain money from Akio and his family. She also made sure to mention that they had no knowledge of what she was using the money for so they wouldn't get in trouble for anything they weren't aware of.

Hiro thought that she was going to say something about Akio's abuse, but was displeased when she skipped over the subject completely.

He couldn't force her into anything she didn't want to speak about, and he knew that. He was there for her now anyways. He wouldn't let Akio lay so much as a finger on her ever again.

She also told the officer of her theory that the man who killed her mother was somebody who her mother owed money to. She couldn't think of anybody else who could do such a thing.

As she was recounting everything that's happened over the past month or two, Hiro couldn't help but think about how strong the girl in front on him truly was.

She had been through so much and yet here she was still standing on her feet. She lost both of her parents, survived an abusive relationship, and was on her own for so long. It broke Hiro's heart to think that the person he cared so much about had to go through all of this, but what could he do? The past was in the past. Hiro just hoped that her future would be bright enough to reward her for all the suffering she had to go through to reach it.

"Morning," Hiro looked up from his homework to see Alex stretching out with a yawn. He smiled gently as she trudged over to the couch near his desk in her pajamas. She plopped down and curled up before looking at Hiro through tired eyes.

"Barely. Why are you up so early?" he asked curiously. While he had homework to catch up on, she had absolutely no reason to be up at 4:34 A.M.

"Couldn't sleep," she mumbled, beginning to drift off once again, "had nightmares."

Hiro frowned. She's been having nightmares quite frequently over the past couple of nights which has been affecting her sleep a lot more than she cared to admit.

"You want to talk about them?" he asked, turning in his chair to face her.

"No, it's okay. You're here now so I should be fine," she said tiredly as her eyes slid closed.

Hiro's eyes widened. A small smile took over his features as he turned back around to finish his homework so he too could get some sleep.

After about another half an hour of solving various formulas, Hiro had put his completed work away and got up out of his seat to stretch. He then turned to the sleeping girl beside him and squatted down to her level.

"Alex," he whispered, nudging her gently.

"Hmm," she groaned in annoyance. Hiro chuckled. Still the same old Alex.

"Well, I could just leave you down here, but I figured you'd want to come upstairs with me to sleep on an actual bed."

After a few seconds of silence, Hiro heard her response.

"Carry me."

His brow rose at the request. He let out a defeated sigh and turned to face away from the couch.

"Come on," he said.

Alex slowly pulled herself off the couch to wrap her arms around his neck and her legs around his waist. She smiled contently when he lifted her off the ground, onto his back, and began to make his way upstairs.

"Thanks Hiro," she whispered into his neck.

"Yeah, yeah. You owe me for this."

A small smile crept its way onto her face before she slipped back into unconsciousness.

Hiro turned his head and saw the smile on her face.

'God, I missed that smile,' he thought to himself as he continued up the stairs to his bedroom.


	19. Chapter 19

**CHAPTER 19! WHOA! One more chapter left guys! Can you believe it? And guess what? Did you guess? If you didn't, then it's too bad for you. I'm going to tell you anyways. I'M GOING TO BE POSTING THE LAST CHAPTER TOMORROW! I know, two chapters back to back? What is this? Anarchy? I guess I just really want to finish posting this so I can move on. I love this story and all of you wonderful people following it and reading it religiously, but I'm so over posting it to be completely honest. I've moved onto other works that you guys can look forward to and am really excited that I was able to finish posting this for you guys! I guess I'm just really happy to finally mark this as completed after all this time.**

 **I'm sorry if you guys miss this, but you can always check out my other stuff! I'll be posting an Avengers one-shot series soon enough that is definitely a more fluffy romance type thing. So, if you guys are interested in that, follow my account and keep an eye out. Until then, I'll be posting random one-shots here and there. I've been on a random, out of the blue, Avengers kick lately, so they'll probably be Avengers/OC based :3**

 **Either way, thank you guys so much for sticking around to this point. I really appreciate it! I'm glad that you've liked the story enough to read it through to the end.**

 **REVIEWS:**

 _ **PhanIsReal:**_ Right? Time flew by so quickly! I'm so glad that you enjoyed this story though! Thank you for reading and supporting me! I really appreciate it! :)

 _ **Momijifan Low-Ki:**_ I completely agree with you about the Tadashi's death thing. That's exactly why I wrote him as alive for this story ;D

 ** _.739:_** XD Oh my gosh! I never thought of it that way! But yeah, I guess I can't say that I've ever thought of that either. Also, thank you! I'm glad you enjoy the story :)

 _ **Zexalloverforever39:**_ Fortunately, Akio shall not be in the rest of the story. He wasn't intended to be a main character in this story. I debated making a side story for him, but I really don't know. I don't think I will because I don't know what I'd do. I don't want to make it seem like his actions were justified, because they weren't, but in real life people don't just act that messed up for no reason at all.

 **DISCLAIMER: I do NOT own Big Hero 6 or the characters in it!**

* * *

" _Alex! Come downstairs sweetie! Dinner is ready!"_

 _A little blonde hair, blue eyes girl looked up from the 500 piece Pokémon puzzle that she had nearly completed. At the sound of the woman's voice, a huge smile broke out on the girl's face as she stood and ran down the stairs excitedly._

 _As she ran through the house, her smile only continued to grow before she plowed her way through one final door, into the kitchen._

 _The woman turned around from her spot over the stove and smiled down at the young girl._

" _What did I tell you about running through the house like that, Alex? You could slip and hurt yourself," she scolded lightly at the child._

 _Alex's smile didn't so much as waver as she mumbled a quick "sorry" and made her way over to her mother._

" _Yay! You made my favorite!" Alex squealed in delight._

 _Her mother chuckled at her excitement, "Of course I did. It is your night to choose after all."_

 _Alex giggled, "When's daddy coming home?"_

" _He should be home any-"_

 _At that moment, both mother and daughter heard the front door open._

" _I'm home!"_

" _Minute," her mother finished._

" _Daddy!"_

 _Alex booked it out of the kitchen, completely forgetting her earlier conversation with her mother. As she went to turn a corner, she bumped into a much larger body, sending her back a couple of steps._

" _Whoa there," her father spoke in amusement, "Somebody's excited to see me."_

 _Alex laughed, "Daddy!"_

 _She leapt into his arms, catching him by surprise. He quickly moved one foot back to prepare himself as she attached herself to him like a leech._

" _How have you been my little spider-monkey?" he asked with a small chuckle._

" _Good daddy! I almost finished that puzzle that you bought me last time you were here! I just have to finish Squirtle and then I'm done!" Alex stated proudly._

 _Her father nodded along as she spoke, soaking in every word she said, "Really? Wow, I didn't expect you to finish that so quickly. You're getting too smart for me. Maybe this time I should get you two puzzles. How does that sound?"_

" _Yeah!" she agreed. He couldn't help but laugh at her enthusiasm. He placed her back down on the ground and walked with her to the kitchen._

 _Alex sat down at the already set table and waited for her parents to come in so they could all eat together. She knew that she wasn't the only person to miss her daddy while he was away and wanted to give her mommy and daddy a few minutes to themselves before they ate._

 _No more than five minutes later, everybody was seated at the dinner table chowing down on some grilled chicken and broccoli casserole._

 _Alex smiled contently as she ate dinner with the two people she loved most. Having family time like this really makes Alex happy. She doesn't get to see her father all the time, but when she does, she soaks up every minute that she can get with him._

 _Later on that night, Alex found her father and herself in her room as she got ready for bed. She quickly ran over to turn on her snowflake night-light before hopping onto her bouncy mattress._

" _Daddy?" she asked as her father tucked her in._

" _Yes sweet-heart?" He had finished tucking her in but remained squatting beside her bed._

" _When are you coming home for good?" she asked with tired eyes._

 _Her father let out a small sigh, "Soon honey. I think this will be my last trip."_

 _Alex smiled drowsily, "Good. I miss you."_

 _His face softened, "I miss you too. Now get some sleep okay? We have a big day tomorrow."_

 _She nodded as her eyes slid shut, "I love you Daddy."_

" _I love you too sweetie."_

* * *

Alex opened her eyes and blinked the tears away. She hadn't had a dream like that in so long…

Instead of the usual nightmares, tonight she was blessed with a memory.

A single tear slipped down her cheek and she frantically brought her hand up to wipe it.

"Ungh," she heard a groan from beside her. She turned around, only to find Hiro lying beside her on his back with his mouth wide open. She felt her tears dry up as she chuckled at the sight. After staying with the Hamada's for a few days, she quickly learned that Hiro was an odd sleeper. He tended to sprawl out and take up as much room as possible, leaving Alex with only a small portion of the bed.

And yes, she has been staying in his bed with him at night. She started off sleeping on the couch but she could barely get a wink of sleep with all the nightmares she was getting. After the first night of not getting any rest, Hiro had dragged her up to his room and told her to just sleep with him. It was kind of awkward at first, but they both eventually got used to it. It actually became quite comforting for her to stay beside him while she slept. He made her feel like nothing could harm her while she was next to him. Most of the nightmares went away after that. She still had a few stragglers, but that's expected.

She let out a sigh as she watched Hiro sleep peacefully. She then turned her body away from him to hide her red eyes.

She felt extremely bitter-sweet at the moment. While she was happy to have dreams about good memories from her past, it just reminded her that all of that is gone now. She won't get her father back, she won't get her mother back, and she won't have broccoli casserole night with the family.

It's really amazing how everything could change so quickly.

As if sensing her depressed mood, Hiro groaned again and turned to face her back. Without even opening his eyes, he wrapped an arm around her waist and pulled her back to his chest, leaving one arm wrapped around her midsection while the other rubbed soothingly at her hip.

She smiled at his actions and relaxed. She really loved being around Hiro. He knew how to calm her down and put her mind at ease. She realized a long time ago that she liked him as more than a friend, but she wanted to wait for him to make the first move. After all that's been happening lately though, there was never really a good time to be worrying about romance or relationships.

Even so, she and Hiro grew much closer after everything. With the way they act, they might as well already be a couple.

'Whenever Hiro decides to ask, I'll be ready to accept,' she thought to herself happily.

But what if he thinks that she doesn't want to be in a relationship with him? What if he thinks that after Akio, she'll never trust enough to go back into a romantic relationship? That's a stupid notion of course, but it makes sense.

Maybe she'd have to make the first move after all…

"Hiro," she whispered. She waited and listened to see if she had woken him.

When she didn't hear any signs of a response, she tried again.

"Hiro."

"Mmm, what?" he mumbled groggily.

"Don't 'what' me, wake up," she whispered.

"I don't wanna," he whined, burying his face into her neck.

A small giggle slipped past her lips, "Hiro, that tickles. Stop it."

She could feel the smile creeping its way onto his face, "Good."

"You're evil," she pouted. After a few seconds of silence, Hiro yawned from behind her and let go of her, pushing himself up so his head was resting in one of his hands.

"How did you sleep?" he asked with half-lidded eyes.

"Fine," Alex replied, turning to face him, "No nightmares."

Hiro smiled, "That's good." He then noticed the red rims and puffiness surrounding her eyes, "Were you crying?"

All sleepiness was gone from Hiro's now tense features, but she was quick to reassure him.

"It's nothing bad," she said quickly. As soon as she saw him relax she continued, "Just dreamt up some memories of my parents."

Hiro deflated at the statement. He knew more than anyone that her parents were a sore subject for her.

"You know, you never told me what happened to your dad," he said cautiously. He really didn't want to make her upset, but he also couldn't help the curiosity he felt towards the subject. All he really knew was that he had passed away.

Alex stared at him for a moment before letting out a large sigh.

"He was in the Army," she stated.

Hiro's eyes widened, "Really?"

"Yeah," she said. A smile quickly took over her face as her eyes glazed over with nostalgia, "He was the bravest, kindest, most wonderful man I've ever known and I am nothing but proud to say that he was my father."

A gentle smirk grew on Hiro's face. He inched his way closer to her and laid on his back, pulling her into his embrace with her head resting on his chest.

"What was he like?" he asked curiously.

"He was amazing," Alex said, holding back tears. "He was so compassionate and caring. I remember the days when he would come home after months of being overseas. I would hear the front door open and his voice call out, "I'm home!" and I would just book it to the front door. Usually, I'd end up crashing into him half way. Mom always did tell me not to run in the house, but I never listened."

Hiro felt himself grinning at her memories. It sounded like she had an amazing family.

"He would always come home with a bright smile on his face. He could have come back missing an arm and a leg and he still would have walked through the door with that same old smile on his face. I knew that he loved coming back home to his us too. He loved me and my mom so much. He was truly an amazing father and husband."

She buried her face in his chest for a few seconds before coming back up with tears in her eyes.

"He said that it was going to be his last trip before he was retiring and coming home permanently," tears started to stream down her face. "Unfortunately, he was never able to make it back."

She couldn't hold it back anymore as the tears began to flow freely.

"I miss him so much," she cried into Hiro's chest.

Hiro felt tears of his own start to build up as he watched her cry in his arms.

She let out all of her pent up emotions. Hiro just laid there and allowed her to vent. He held her as she sobbed and did his best to comfort her by rubbing a hand over her back. It took a good 20 minutes for her sobs to calm down to small hiccups.

"You really are the best Hiro, thank you."

"Of course."

"I think my dad would like you."

"Really?" he asked. "Well I hope so. I'd never want to do anything to upset him."

"Don't worry," she said, a small smile appearing on her face, "I don't think that's possible."

* * *

"So what'd they say?" Tadashi asked his aunt from the kitchen. She had just gotten off the phone with Alex's case worker and Tadashi wanted to know whether they would be gaining custody of Alex or not.

"Well," Aunt Cass said while she leaned up against the counter, "she said that there really shouldn't be any problems with us gaining custody over her since she had no family listed on records. Even with that being said, however, we still have to go down to the courthouse to fill out all the paperwork and sign a few documents."

"So we're definitely going to be able to adopt her?" Tadashi questioned.

"From what I've gathers, yes," she replied.

Tadashi smiled. Hiro's going to love to hear this.

"Great. And when will we be able to go take care of all the paperwork?" he asked.

"I can go tomorrow morning, but you'll have to watch the shop for me while I'm gone. Are you okay with that?" she asked.

"Of course. I'm going to go tell the two lovebirds the news. I'll be right back."

Aunt Cass nodded with a chuckle before going back to cooking breakfast for everybody.

Tadashi was happy, to say the least, that Alex was going to be able to stay with them. He didn't know where she would have ended up otherwise, and that thought disturbed him. Alex has grown as part of the family and Tadashi is very protective over his family.

Plus, this gave him the perfect excuse to tease Hiro on a daily basis. How could he not be excited for that?

Once he reached the room he shared with Hiro, and Alex since she's been having nightmares, he peeked his head in to see if the two were awake yet.

What he was met with was a sight that made him smile.

On Hiro's bed, there was Hiro who was using his arm to prop him up into a sitting position, and then there was Alex who was lying in his lap as his other hand brushed through her blonde locks.

They looked like they were talking about random stuff, laughing occasionally. Other than that, they just seemed to be enjoying each other's company.

Time to mess with them.

"You know, you guys are lucky Honey isn't here or she would already have an entire photo album on her phone dedicated to Hilex," he smirked while leaning comfortably against the doorframe.

Alex jumped at the older Hamada's sudden appearance, pulling herself up to face his direction. Hiro, on the other hand, just narrowed his eyes at his brother's antics.

"Sorry, didn't mean to scare you so much Alex." He walked over to take a seat at Hiro's desk.

"I wasn't scared," she pouted, "just startled."

Both brother's looked at her with knowing smirks, "Mmhmm."

"Oh, shut up," she murmured with a glare. Both Hiro and Tadashi laughed at her embarrassed behavior before Hiro cut in.

"So, what was it that you came in here for Dashi?"

Alex quickly got over her little pouting fit and turned her attention to the young adult sitting beside the bed in Hiro's desk chair.

"Well," Tadashi started, "Aunt Cass just got a call from Alex's case worker and I figured you guys would want to hear what she said."

He relayed all the information that Aunt Cass had previously told him downstairs. Both teens relaxed as he continued to tell them everything that he knew. By the end of Tadashi's mini dialogue, both Hiro and Alex had grins the size of the sun spread across their face.

"So I'm going to be able to stay here?" Alex asked hopefully.

"With the way things are looking, I'm going to have to say yes," Tadashi chuckled.

Alex quickly turned to Hiro to gouge his reaction towards the news. As soon as she saw a smile to match hers on his face, she practically leapt on him, wrapping her arms around his neck in a tight hug.

"I can't believe this is really happening!" she exclaimed into Hiro's neck.

"Aunt Cass will be going to the court house tomorrow morning to take care of all the paperwork so I'm going to need your help, Hiro, to run of the shop until she gets back."

"Will do," Hiro nodded to him over Alex's shoulder, his arms wrapped tightly around her waist.

After relishing in the moment for a little while longer, Alex pulled away from Hiro.

"Hey Tadashi, is Aunt Cass downstairs?" she asked.

Confused, Tadashi nodded, "Yeah, why?"

Without a single word, Alex pulled herself out of the bed and hurried out the door. Hiro and Tadashi looked at each other with the same questioning glance before hesitantly following her.

After walking down stairs and into the kitchen, at a much more reasonable speed than Alex previously had, they saw a surprised Aunt Cass staring down at Alex who currently had her arms wrapped around the older woman's torso.

Aunt Cass looked over to the boys with a look that asked "what's going on?" to which both boys just shrugged in response.

"Um, sweetie? Is everything alright?" Aunt Cass asked reluctantly.

Alex quickly pulled away with a sheepish smile on her face, "Oh, yeah sorry. I just really wanted to say thank you. You don't understand how much I appreciate you doing all this for me. You could have easily just let me go live in some orphanage or foster home, but instead you've been kind enough to take me into your own home. I just- I can't begin to describe how much this all means to me. Thank you."

Aunt Cass's eyes widened.

"Oh honey," she smiled, "don't mention it! I would never just leave you on your own like that. You're such a sweetheart."

Hiro saw a blush cross over Alex's cheeks at the compliment and grinned. She's so cute when she blushes.

"Why don't you help the boys set the table while I finish up breakfast," Aunt Cass added as she turned to finish the last of the pancakes.

Alex nodded and stood to the side with Hiro as Tadashi grabbed the plates from the cabinet and handed them to the two. Tadashi then grabbed the silverware and followed Hiro and Alex over to the table to set everything down in its designated spot.

It didn't take much longer for Aunt Cass to finish up the food and soon everybody was sitting around the table, loading their plates with pancakes and syrup.

"So Hiro, when are you planning to take Alex out on your first date?" Tadashi asked with a sly smirk on his face.

Hiro nearly choked on a chunk of pancake. He sent a dark glare at his brother. Before he could respond with anything, however, Aunt Cass's gasp cut him off.

"Oh my gosh, is it finally official?! When did this happen?!" she squealed like a high school girl.

Alex blushed crimson. She tried her hardest to focus on her food and avoid anybody seeing her flaming cheeks, but Tadashi had already seen it which only made his smirk grow to creepy proportions.

"I didn't- we're not- ugh! Never mind," Hiro sighed, sinking down in his seat.

Despite her embarrassment, Alex couldn't help but laugh at the scene in front of her. It's been a while since she's sat down for a meal like this. She never noticed how much she missed it until now.

As she looked around the table at the three people who have changed her life so much, she wondered how she was lucky enough to have met such amazing people. She thought back to the dream she had earlier. Instead of feeling sad and depressed about it though, she realized that maybe things weren't as bad as they seemed.

Or course, nobody could ever replace her mother or father. That's a given. But maybe it was a bit much to say she no longer has a family. These people right here, they're her family now. Even if they're not related by blood, they've still been there for her through thick and thin. They took her in when she had nowhere else to go, and they treated her with warmth and compassion when it seemed like her entire world had gone cold. They brought her out of the rut she was in. They made her smile when clouds were grey.

So, sure, her parents were gone. And sure, she didn't have any other blood relatives left. But she still had Aunt Cass, Tadashi, and most of all, Hiro. That alone was enough to assure her that things were going to be okay.

She was going to be okay.


	20. Chapter 20

**Guys... Holy cow... It's completed! WHAAA! I can't believe it's completed! Can you?!**

 **YES, this is the last chapter! Crazy isn't it? Now to get sappy for a moment, I just want to say to everybody who has been following this story from the beginning, or those who have just found it and binged it to catch up (yes, I know you guys are out there ;D), thank you all SOOOOO much! I feel so happy to say that I've finished this story with such an amazing following! So, to all of you, you know who you are, thank you! You're the best!**

 **NOW, if you guys are interested in seeing what I'll be working on in the future, please stick around and follow me for updates! I don't think I'll be working on anymore Big Hero 6, but I may come back to it in the future. I definitely had some ideas for the BH6 fandom, so who knows? You may see more of that later on. But for now, as I've said last chapter, I've been on an Avengers kick, so you'll probably be seeing a lot of that around here :3 AND Inuyasha as well. It's weird, no matter how much fanfic I read for Inuyasha, I never get sick of it. I just love it so much I guess haha!**

 **So yeah, here's the last chapter! Again, thank you all for sticking around till the end and I really hope you awesome people follow me and check out some of my other stuff that's to come!**

 **REVIEWS:**

 _ **Momijifan Low-Ki:**_ I see you feel strongly over the whole Akio topic. I understand what a lot of people wanted to see him get what he deserved, but he wasn't a main character in this story. Alex was. And honestly, I didn't really want to write him getting busted, because in real life, not all people get the justice they deserve. Sometimes, things are just left as they are. As I said last chapter, I was debating making a side-story for Akio, but I don't really have any good ideas for that, and I really don't want it to seem like I'm justifying his behavior, because in no way was what he did justifiable. And yes, really. Don't bash Hilex. I know it's awesome, you're just jealous. ;)

* * *

"Come on Hiro! Can you just tell me where we're going already?"

"I told you, it's a surprise," Hiro said for what seemed like the hundredth time that night. "What kind of surprise would it be if I gave in and told you?"

Alex sighed, "I hate it when you're right."

Hiro smirked. He had told Alex that morning that he had something planned for them, but he had refused to tell her what that something was. He knew it was starting to annoy her, but she'd forget all about that once they got to where they were going.

"Can you at least give me a hint?" she asked, wiggling her nose in an attempt to adjust the blindfold that Hiro had wrapped around her head.

"Sure," he shrugged, "it's in the direction we're going."

Alex stopped, "Wow. That was so helpful."

"Hey, the sarcasm isn't needed missy," he scolded playfully.

"I'm not getting anything out of you, am I?"

"Nope!"

"Ugh!" Alex groaned with a pout. Hiro chuckled at her expression. She's such a kid sometimes. Although he really has no room to talk because he definitely has his moments.

"Okay," Hiro said as he pulled Alex to a stop, "we're almost there. We just have a few stairs ahead of us."

"Stairs?" she asked. "Where the heck did you drag me to?"

"Oh just relax. You trust me, don't you?"

"Of course," she said without hesitation. Hiro smiled.

"Good, then have some faith in me will you?" he muttered with a smirk.

She sighed, "Fine."

"Alright, now hold onto my arm and go one step at a time," he said wrapping an arm around her waist to secure her.

"I'm going to die on these stairs, aren't I?" she whined.

"Would you stop with the theatrics?"

"Not my fault I'm a klutz."

"You're not a klutz."

"I am when I'm walking upstairs blindfolded."

"That's what you have me for, right?"

"Yeah…"

"Wow Alex. I'm hurt."

"Mhm," Alex mumbled.

After a few minutes of working slowly up the stairs, Hiro and Alex had finally made it to the top.

"Finally!" Alex exclaimed. "If you ever drag my upstairs blindfolded again, I will steal all the gummy bears you have hidden in your room."

Hiro visibly winced, "Harsh much?"

"That's the point," she stated with her arms crossed. If Hiro were able to see her eyes, he had a feeling that they would be fixed in a glare.

"Okay, okay! Just a few more steps and then you can take off the blindfold. I swear," he assured her.

"Thank cheesus! You know Hiro, I never thought you were into this kind of thing."

Hiro's face immediately turned beet red, "What?! I'm not!"

"Say that to the blindfold," Alex smirked.

"Oh shut it," he mumbled bashfully. It was quiet for a few moments as Hiro continued to drag a grinning Alex to the door.

"Alright, you ready?" he asked nervously. He didn't really know where to do this at first, but after remembering this place, he knew she'd love it.

"I've been ready since you had me put this blindfold on," she scoffed. Hiro rolled his eyes at her remark. He took a deep breath, and opened to door to lead her through.

He took a quick look around to make sure everything was perfect before reaching to untie Alex's blindfold.

When the cloth slipped away from Alex's face, she was left gaping.

"This… Oh Hiro," she breathed in awe. She was speechless. The spot that Hiro had taken her to had been none other than their spot on the roof of the hotel on 34th Avenue. This alone was an incredibly sweet gesture, but what really threw her off were the lights, candles, and small picnic-style dining area set up in the usually empty space.

Hiro looked at the quiet girl beside him in anticipation.

"So, do you like it? I know it's kind of last minute and all, but I really wanted to do something special. Plus, it kind of gives us a breather from all that's been happening lately," he sputtered nervously.

"Hiro," Alex said as she snapped out of her trance. "I love it. There's no need to ramble."

Hiro perked, "Really?"

"Yes, thank you," she smiled gratefully. Hiro blushed lightly at this smile before moving over to the blanket set up on the floor.

"Well, why don't we eat something? I brought some stuff from the bakery," he grinned mischievously.

Alex raised a brow, "I'm assuming from the look on your face that you didn't have permission to steal your poor aunt's food."

Hiro shrugged, "Meh, I'm sure she won't mind."

Alex rolled her eyes as she sat down, "Well, what kind of goodies did you rob for us?"

"You don't have to say it like that, jeez," he mumbled under his breath. He then started pulling things out of the small basket, "I got a couple of cinnamon spice doughnuts, your favorite, some OJ for me, and some cranberry juice for you. Why do you like this stuff anyways? It's so bitter."

"Well, I like bitter. Don't judge me," she said, snatching the drink out of Hiro's hand. He couldn't help but smile when she stuck her tongue out at him. Hiro found it nice to see this side of Alex again. She's been through so much at this point and had to grow up at such a young age due to her mother's negligence. She deserves to let loose and relax like this every once and a while.

Alex and Hiro spent the next couple of hours eating, joking around, and talking about nothing in particular. Hiro had made sure to let his Aunt and brother know where Alex and he would be going so they didn't freak out if the two were a bit past curfew. With that being said, the two teens were able to relax and not have to worry about getting home before anybody got suspicious, which always seemed to be a problem for them when they went out before all the drama happened.

After cleaning up the trash from their "dinner", the two found themselves sitting side-by-side gazing up at the stars.

Hiro glanced over at Alex every couple of minutes, trying to build up the courage to let it all out and tell her how he felt. He knew this was the perfect time and place to do it, but he found that the lingering doubt in the back of his mind was holding him back.

He knew that even if she denied his feelings they would still be best friends. Nothing would change that. But it still wouldn't be the same.

Hiro really needed to know if she felt the same way though.

With that being said, he decided to just go for it.

"Hey Alex, I need to talk to you about something," he said.

Alex furrowed her brows at the serious tone in his voice, "Uh, okay. What is it? Is everything alright?"

Hiro opened his mouth to speak, but closed it again, not knowing what to say. He did this a couple of times before Alex had enough and turned to face him completely.

"Hiro, what's wrong? Did something happen?" she asked in concern.

Hiro's eyes widened, "No! Nothing's wrong. I just… There's something I need to tell you."

Alex's shoulder's sagged in relief, "Okay, what is it then? I'm all ears."

'This is it,' Hiro thought to himself. 'You can do this. Just say it.'

He took a deep breath.

"Well, you see… I've kind of- no, I mean I do- I um…" Hiro stuttered, not knowing how to say it.

Alex rose a brow at his word vomit, "Hiro. Calm down and just speak."

"O-okay," he murmured. "It's just that- I like you a lot! There I said it! And don't think that I meant as a friend either, because I like you way more than that. I'd even say that I love you!"

It was quiet.

Hiro cursed himself, 'Wow Hiro, how romantic. You should consider poetry because that was just beautiful.'

After what felt like an hour of silence, Hiro felt his stomach drop.

Maybe he shouldn't have told her. Now he probably made her feel really awkward because who would like him like tha-

Hiro's thoughts were cut off when he felt Alex's arms wrapping tightly around his neck.

"Finally! You know for a genius, you sure are dense," she giggled into his neck.

Hiro sat there shocked. 'What just happened?' he thought to himself.

"Wait, what?"

Alex pulled back just enough to see his face without letting go of him.

"Do you know how long I was waiting for you to tell me that? Jeez, and just when I was starting to think that you just thought of me as a friend you go and surprise me like this," she said in disbelief.

"Wait," Hiro started, still trying to wrap his head around what she was saying, "You mean, you like me too?"

Alex rolled her eyes, "Of course I do!"

Hiro blinked. Suddenly, everything processed in his head and the biggest smile lit up his face.

"Really?!"

"I think you're in denial," Alex stated.

Hiro laughed. He wrapped his arms around her waist and squeezed. He felt her grip on his neck tighten and he buried his face in her neck, taking a deep breath and sighing in relief. She likes him. All the worrying he was doing was for nothing!

"I thought you didn't want to be in a relationship because of everything with Akio," he muttered into her neck.

Alex sighed and pulled away once again, "I'm not going to lie, what happened with Akio did mess me up a bit, but that's in the past. What happened, happened. I can't change it and I shouldn't let it run my life. Plus, Akio was a complete jackass. You're nothing like Akio. I trust you 100% Hiro. I know you would never do anything to hurt me, especially like he did."

Hiro's giant grin faded into a soft smile. How had he been lucky enough to meet a girl like Alex?

"You're amazing, you know that right?"

Alex smirked, "Well, I do try. It's nice to see that all my hard work is appreciated though."

The smile slipped from Hiro's face and was replaced with a poker face, "You just had to go there didn't you?"

"Always," she said with a sweet smile.

Hiro shook his head and scoffed before smiling again.

"Anyways, I know that this should kind of be obvious at this point, but I still want to ask. Alex, will you make me happier than any amount of gummy bears could ever accomplish and be my girlfriend?" he asked humorously.

Alex held in her laughter to reply, "Yes, but only if you cut gummy bears out of your life completely."

Hiro's eyes widened, "What?! But why? Are you serious?!"

Alex couldn't help it. She burst out laughing, rolling onto her side with her arms around her stomach.

Hiro continued to stare at her in horror, "Alex, were you serious or are you just joking?"

It took a few seconds, but Alex was finally able to collect herself enough to speak.

"I'm joking Hiro," she said in between ragged breaths. "Don't worry, I'll never give you that ultimatum. You may dump me for it."

Hiro let out a deep sigh.

"Thank god," he whispered under his breath.

Alex chuckled a few more times before sitting up from her previous position on the floor.

"I would never dump you for gummy bears Alex"," Alex mocked in a deep voice. "Is it too much to ask for a response like that?"

Hiro scooted over to Alex. He wrapped his arms around her and pulled her into his lap so her back was pressed up against his chest.

"Don't worry," he whispered in her ear, "I'd gladly give up gummy bears for you any day."

Alex gasped in shock, "Wow, you weren't kidding when you said you love me."

Hiro smiled, "I wouldn't dare joke around about something so serious."

They then sat there in silence. Not an uncomfortable silence, but the silence that speaks louder than words. The silence that didn't need to be filled with random conversation.

As they sat there staring up at the stars together, they felt content. Hiro with his arms wrapped tightly around the girl that means more to him than gummy bears, and Alex with the one person that makes her feel safest and most secure.

"Hey Hiro?" Alex asked quietly to get his attention.

"Yes?"

Alex turned her upper body around in his lap and pecked the unsuspecting Hiro on the lips. His eyes widened. Before he had time to react, however, her back was once again facing him.

"I love you too," she said, relaxing into his hold.

His wide eyes softened.

He moved to rest his chin on her shoulder, but first placed a loving kiss on her temple. She leaned into the kiss, placing her arms over the ones that were holding her.

Both Hiro and Alex felt like they could stay like this forever. In their special place. With the person they loved. Nothing could beat this.

Nothing at all.


End file.
